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bts-sierra · 3 years

Text

Pretty Boy

Jimin x Reader [ft. Eunwoo]

Genre: Angst, Smut

Warnings: Explicit sexual content, alcohol consumption and swearing-ish.

Word Count: 6k

Masterlist

A/N: This is the first part of my "Pretty Boy" mini series for Jimin. It's very detailed and elaborate because I wanted to try writing a piece from the perspective of the female gaze. There will probably be a lot more eventual smut and plot development going forth; this one was just setting the story. Nonetheless, I hope you guys read it and like it!

“I keep forgetting you’re a Comp Sci major. You know, I never would’ve guessed that when we met,” Tally says scooting into the empty seat beside you.

“Because I’m a girl?” You roll your eyes at her.

“Remember, you’re talking to a Mechanical Engineering student. That wouldn’t surprise me,” she retaliates.

“Actually, statistically speaking, Mechanical Engineering has a close balance between women and men in the field. Computer Science, not so much. You should see all my other classes, I’m basically one of the twelve girls in a class of over a hundred.”

“Ugh, of course you’d talk numbers. Was NOT the point, but hey, this class doesn’t seem so bad, does it?”

“Yeah, since a lot more mech and business students will be in it, ya know. Kinda how the math works. Jeez, how’d you pass all your classes so far?” you tease.

“Ah, yes. Love it when your best friend calls you dumb.”

The class falls silent as the professor makes his way up to the board.

“Computer Graphics & Design,” he writes.

You’d been looking forward to this course throughout your degree. It was the only one that combined your interests and your academic work in the slightest. You didn’t regret choosing a degree like Computer Science, but you’d known no other option your whole life. So, it always surprised people when they walked into your room expecting to find mechanical keyboards and spare hardware laying around a desk with 3 monitors running code from top to bottom and left to right, but instead, they found books, artwork, and crafty decor.

You’re unconsciously scribbling notes while Tally clicked away at her laptop keys. Another reason she’d initially suspected you were perhaps unsure about your major because God forbid a Comp Sci kid wasn’t glued to a screen with a keyboard.

Halfway through the class, the prof decides that the class wasn’t lively enough. “Come on, guys. This is only the first day, aren’t you all supposed to be excited and eager to learn?”

Clearly, he was forgetting that this was a senior capstone class and most of you were just wanting to graduate at this point. But, for a class that overlapped with two other degrees, you sure did expect it to be slightly more bumpin’. As bumpin’ as a graphics class could get, at least.

“Let’s actually set aside today’s agenda and why don’t we instead try to divide ourselves into groups to do an activity.”

The whole class whines collectively, which is fair enough considering the last time a prof was this involved and set up class activities was back in first year.

“I want you all to discuss yourselves. See what got you here and what you hope to do going forth. See if there’s someone else who follows a similar path as yours or if they’re on the opposite end of the spectrum. See if that pulls you closer to one another or pushes you further apart. Uncover the mystery of yourselves; humans are complex systems, just like computers,” the prof reasons.

There’s contemplation among the students, a lot of muttering and concentrated faces.

“And a lot of you forget why you started or forget that this isn’t the only path for you. This is one of your best chances at rediscovering or redirecting yourselves,” he concludes. And with that, the whole class scrambled to make groups.

You loved profs like this, truth be told. The ones that genuinely cared about you and your future.

You stir in your seat, trying to take in all the faces of the people seated around you. You hated to admit it but you weren’t as observant as you always claimed. In fact, you had the most tunnel vision a person could imagine sometimes; focusing on the most unnecessary things and letting the essential things slip through. So, you now force yourself to pay equal attention to the people, their features, the way they interacted and what they chose to focus on. Tunnel vision or not, you could read people fairly well.

Except, when your eyes come upon his. You loved reading people, but you hated being read by another. And just like that, you couldn’t quite focus on anything, eyes scanning an empty paper on your table like it had instructions printed on them. You’ve paid attention to boys before, but they were mostly just nice to look at when you got bored. They were never really distracting like the one seated behind you.

You fidget with your pen as you look back up at him hesitantly. This time I’ll be fine. He’s just another boy. Your eyes trace his jaw as you convince yourself and stop momentarily upon his full lips before bringing them to meet his gaze. They weren’t on you anymore, but you could swear that you felt his eyes burn holes through the back of your neck only a few moments ago. You’re distracted when he brings his arm up, flexing as his fingers racked through his hair. He had such dark eyes which matched his hair, but such dainty little features, you noticed. The prof’s words echo through your head; you didn’t need to know him to understand that he was a complex system, he just seemed like it.

You pry your eyes away from the delicate tendons on the back of his hand and finally bring them to meet his gaze. He was intently watching you studying him as he had previously, his intense gaze contrasts the slight curve of his mouth. His tongue swipes across his bottom lip, spit providing to be his own personal lip gloss. His lips were the prettiest shade of pink, and you hated pink.

“Amusing,” you hear him whisper to himself. He presses his lips together in an attempt to control himself from grinning, forcing the lightest trace of a dimple along his right cheek. There was nothing you could read, but your eyes remained fixated on him, taking in every little feature and detail.

He pulls his chair closer, “I’m Jimin,” he states. Before you could respond, Tally whips around in her seat to face the both of you.

“Wait, I think I know you. Aren’t you dating Sierra?”

Contradictory to how you just felt a while ago, your eyes dart instantly trying to find his. And although his face is angled towards Tally, he watches your reaction as he replies.

“Why would that matter?”

You roll your eyes because of course a boy like him would respond to a question with another. Way to stay mysterious.

“Gosh, of course she’s dating one of you,” Tally confirms.

“But he didn’t really say anything,” you say out loud by mistake.

You turn to look between Tally and Jimin now that you’ve brought yourself into this conversation. Through the side, you see an accomplished grin plastered on his face, causing you to crumple the corner of the paper that was placed under your hand. How could a boy be this infuriating and intriguing all the same?

“Oh, I didn’t need him to agree or disagree. His reply told me everything I needed to know,” she glares at him as she speaks. “He’s exactly her type, the kind that doesn’t fully commit.”

“That’s not what it is. We just haven’t talked about ourselves exclusively. So, I wouldn’t know what to say or make of it either ways,” he says casually.

You could already see the way he made Tally’s blood boil and you knew fully well why. She’d spent way too many late nights staying up to help her friend through yet another breakdown because of a boy. You look away not knowing what to do with any of the information, tuning the two of them out as you start to doodle on the piece of crumpled paper.

A few minutes later you hear Jimin say, “It’s not my fault now is it? She chooses to take an interest in me.”

You face them, “This conversation is going nowhere. You both despise each other, and you make the other’s life unarguably harder, cool. Moving on- “

You’re cut off by Tally looking at you with great offence. “I make HIS life harder. How?” That was not the point but of course Tally got stuck up on that.

“What I meant was, I’m sure he expected to walk into his design class and not an interrogation room. Besides, I don’t really know what the full story is and neither do I want to uncover it now. So can we get back to our class activity?” you suggest.

“Fine, but I’m switching with someone else,” she says as she kicks her chair back. Sometimes you wondered how Tally wasn’t a drama major.

“So, what do you want to know?” Jimin follows up with you.

“Nothing, I think I’ve heard enough,” you lie. You hated how you itched to know more, more about him outside of the impression that Tally seems to have formed for the both of you.

“Right, if you insist,” is all he leaves it at. Besides. it wasn’t that you really cared much to begin with, but why then did you feel like that was a missed chance.

You continue to outline a sketch onto the same sheet of crumpled paper. This was going to become one of your favourite works, you can tell. You always could.

“Yeah, I’m in my final year of my MIS degree,” you overhear Jimin talking. From the corner of your eye, you see one of those pretty party girls flutter her eyes and lean into him as she speaks. He was clearly a magnet for certain types of girls, and he very much thrived off of it.

The girl continues to speak but you couldn’t care to listen, still hung up on the fact that Jimin’s not one of those entitled business students.

“Well, I started out as a Business major with a focus in Marketing but over time I took an interest in Tech companies through the stock market trends and that led me to switch to MIS, I guess,” he continues.

It’s almost like magic how you never seem to keep up with what the girl has to say but every time that he has a reply for her, you activate some sort of spidey sense unbeknownst to you.

You hear him laugh and goddamn is it the prettiest laugh you’ve heard. Can laughs even be considered pretty?You’re quite surprised she managed to crack him up, you on the other hand can’t figure for the life of you what his sense of humor remotely is.

“I get that a lot, but despite looking fit, I’m not very athletic. I like contemporary dance if anything.” His voice drops a couple of octaves as if he was hoping she wouldn’t catch on to the latter half and it seems to have worked since she dismisses it altogether. She places her hand on his arm as she pretends to show an interest in sports even though he’d just stated that his interests laid elsewhere.

You scoff inwardly, not because you have anything against the girl, but because you just couldn’t be bothered with them anymore.

You’ve covered half of the paper, the white underneath the ink hardly visible. You pause when a cute boy heads over to your desk, shoving everything under your text in a panic. Not that you thought anybody would get what it was in the first place, since it was mostly jargon to anybody that wasn’t you, but all the more because your perfectionist self couldn’t let anyone lay their eyes on your unfinished work.

You spend the rest of class talking to a couple more people and getting to know them on a much deeper level than you’d anticipated you would. But it was one way to start off the final year, making more friends that you had in the initial years of college.

The prof begins to conclude the class while everyone starts to move back to their original seats to pack their stuff. You’re surprised when the cute boy you’d previously spoken with, makes his way over. With his bag flung on one shoulder and a basketball in the other, Eunwoo looked like the stereotypical athlete. But he was the farthest thing from it, the same way you weren’t the typical nerd with glasses and your eyes plastered to a screen, executing codes. You hate that about the world; label. Everybody has to fit a certain description and act a certain way. On the contrary, it was what you liked most about people; that element of surprise. Not being who the world tells them to be but just who they want to be.

Eunwoo insists on walking with you to your next class. “It’s on the way to practise, why not?” And if you knew better, arguing was not going to do you any good, only further delay you.

You absentmindedly grab all your belongings from the desk and shove it into your bag. Some of them roll off the desk and you curse, reaching for them when Tally swats your hand. She urges you to go with the cute boy, promising that she would grab your stuff and hand it over back home.

——————

Eunwoo was the cutest junior, if you’ve ever seen one. You guys exchanged numbers and would grab coffee from the cafe on campus between classes. He made you feel comfortable despite the fact that he would try pushing his boundaries, but that was only because you would let him.

“I’m not looking for anything, it’s too late to start now,” you say sipping on your coffee as he holds the doors to the science building open.

“But how can you be so sure without having completely looked?” You can tell this is one of those times he’s indirectly trying to gage if he was going to have a challenge with you.

You hated false hope, so even though you would flirt back every so often, you liked to shut things down the moment it got any series than it needed to be.

“I have though. There really isn’t anybody for me. Besides what’s the point if I leave in a year anyhow? It’s not worth it.”

You see his face fall slightly at your reply, but you playfully nudge him and start to tease him instead, to distract him.

——————

“Some of the guys on the team are throwing a party after the game on Friday. Would you be able to make it?” Eunwoo asks as he dribbles the ball along the pavement on your guys’ way back home.

“Uh.. I haven’t been to parties in a while. I swore off them.”

“Come on now, don’t be a grandma. This is your final year, live a little.” He passes the ball to you, as if implying the ball was in your court to make a decision now.

Eunwoo wasn’t wrong in that you probably needed to relax a little bit more and enjoy your last months here.

“Fine, I’ll go. But only because you asked,” you say as you shove the ball back at him.

——————

You’re at the party, a little late and a little tipsy, scanning the room for Eunwoo. There are people bumping into you and alcohol spilling out of the red solo cups, reminding you why this wasn’t your vibe anymore. An arm wraps around your waist, pulling you towards thi pong table. You’re tense up until the boy turns around, flashing you a smile. Eunwoo.

“Congratulations! You guys won the first game of the season,” you half smile and half scream.

“Only because you were there.”

Eunwoo definitely was the definition of perfect. Always had the perfect words ready for the perfect of times. You simply offer him a smile.

“Come on, I called the table and you’re my partner for the night.”

“We’ve got to beat them,” he bends to whisper in your ear as you arrange the cups.

He straightens back up and nods at your opponent to let them know you guys were ready.

“Are we really still playing by King’s Court?” the annoyance in your voice evident.

You feel Eunwoo’s cold hand wrap around the back of your neck, his fingers rubbing your skin lightly as if to soothe you. He was a lot more touchy than usual, probably an effect of the alcohol coursing through his system. You grab his arm, bringing yourself to your tip toes

“I’m only your best player here,” and you’ve never seen a man smile wider.

Caught up in the boy beside you, you hadn’t yet acknowledged that it was already your guys’ turn now. Eunwoo tilts his head towards the table, prompting you to shoot first. You wet the ball, a habit you’d formed for God knows what reason, before looking up to finally face your opponents.

Suddenly you weren’t so sure about the faith you held in your hand-eye coordination. Although Jimin’s across the table from you, you feel caged. He was by no means as tall and big as Eunwoo but somehow, he was the one taking up all your space and constricting you. It finally dawns on you why Eunwoo felt the need to win the game; it wasn’t really that as much as it was that he wanted to beat Jimin. You steady your breath, slowly blowing out through your mouth as your eyes fix themselves on his.

Eunwoo seems to be very enthusiastic about the game, pulling you further into him every time you guys get balls back or make an explosion. And you gladly allow yourself to be swayed by the boy beside you, rather than the one in front of you. Maybe this isn’t so bad. It’s almost like Jimin could read your mind and picked up the pace of the game, the girl beside him barely making any contribution. You could tell he was more focused now with the way his jaw clenched and the way he took a tad bit longer, rolling the ball between his fingers before he made his shot. And it sucks for you because all you can think of is how sharp his jaw is and how that contrasts his softer cheeks. The glint from the rings on his fingers cause you to wonder how pretty his hands contrast the accessories they displayed.

You slightly shake your head when you feel Eunwoo’s elbow nudge your shoulder. It was your turn. Crap. You brace yourself for the worst as you shift your focus to the cups. You ask Eunwoo to help steady you as you raise yourself, aiming to make the final shot. Eunwoo’s hands on your hips, let’s you know you can use him as support. You lean back slightly until your back rests against his chest as you angle your hand and shoot. The ball hits the rim and runs along it before falling to the table. The frustration you felt was clearly visible as you pressed your lips tighter together and your hands squeezed into itself, causing your nails to dig into your palm. You feel Eunwoo shift from behind you as you look up to him, mouthing the word “Sorry.” You look back to Jimin, fully expecting his face to have the biggest smile plastered, but there was no reaction. And that almost bothers you more than finding him enjoying your failure.

Eunwoo doesn’t seem too bothered by the shot either, instead he seems to be smiling to himself. That’s when it clicks for you, he doesn’t realize you missed the shot because of Jimin’s change in demeanour, but because you were distracted by his close proximity. And how you wished that was really the case.

It’s okay, it’s just the last cup, you tell yourself. You still have another chance before they call redemption. Except to your disbelief, the girl from class scored. For the first time the whole game and it only riled you up even more. Jimin finally let out a smile, his tongue prodding the insides of his cheek.

Just like that, the tables turned, and it was your guys’ redemption shot instead. Eunwoo made it in with ease and it took everything in you to hope and pray that you made this last shot. Jimin wasn’t going to break your resolve, not when you were this close to beating him. You move your line of sight from the last cup standing to his. You watch as he picks up his cup, holding it a little tighter than needed as he brings it to his lips, emptying the rest of its contents even before you’ve made your shot. It confuses you but you lean forward, making sure your elbow doesn’t go over the edge of the table, making your shot. The ball makes contact with the liquid in the cup, and you hear Eunwoo cheer beside you but your eyes remain fixed on Jimin’s. How was he sure you’d make that shot?

It was all up to Jimin now, taking their final redemption shot. This could potentially go on for long and you’re so close to convincing Eunwoo to leave the table with you. Jimin’s eyes never leave yours, he doesn’t even bother checking for the position of the cup before taking his shot. The ball hits the rim and bounces off the side and falls to the floor. You guys had beaten them, but why didn’t it quite feel that way? Did he let me win?

You didn’t have time to process much before Eunwoo sweeps you up for a hug. “Yeah, we did it,” you hear him state.

“Of course, we did. I told you, I’m only the best,” you smile.

You look back over to Jimin who’s making his way over to the other corner of the house where they’re playing some version of stack cups.

Another game later, Eunwoo leaves your side to go grab another drink for the next game. It just wasn’t as exciting anymore, so you tell him that you’d find him before heading out to the club. You decide to text Tally, trying to figure out where in the crowd she was.

“The second room on the right, by the washroom,” she replies.

You head over to that room, the door clicking shut behind you.

“Hey, what’s going on?” you say, confused as to why she’s in the room alone with Sierra.

Almost as if in response, Sierra looks up at you and that’s when you notice the trail of wet mascara along her cheeks. It must be Jimin.

“Sorry I’m holding her up in here, it’s just, he’s with another girl. At this party,” she blurts out.

Tally looks at you like this was just routine and part of their nights out.

“Who? Jimin?” you ask, hesitantly.

“Yeah, but I mean, I did tell him that I had to stop seeing him for my own good. It’s just I didn’t expect him to have another girl ready is all.”

Tally sighs. “This is how it is though. All the men we know suck, I can’t wait to graduate.”

“It didn’t really seem like they were together, though. She’s just choosing to stick to him,” you say almost in his defence. Or were you trying to convince yourself of that? Whatever the reason, you should’ve just shut up.

“Really?” you see her eyes light up slightly and Tally lightly swats your head in response, her eyes going wide in warning.

If you didn’t already hate yourself, you definitely do now.

“Maybe not, who knows with him. You were right to do what you did, you deserve better,” you say in an attempt to discredit your previous thought.

“Yeah, I guess. I should’ve brought another guy with me tonight,” she says as if that was the fix.

“No. No more boys,” Tally reminds her.

“Do you want me to get you guys anything?” you offer.

“Yeah, actually. Some water and bread,” Tally responds for the both of them. “We gotta sober up just a bit and then we’re good to head to the club.”

You nod at her, slowly getting off the bed and heading towards the kitchen. This house had the most random layout you realize as you struggle to find your way about. You weren’t even really drunk so this wasn’t even on you, definitely the architect’s fault.

You open the fridge, grabbing two slices of bread and filling up a large glass of water as you make your way back. Second room to the right.

You barge back in, kicking the door shut behind you, expecting to find your two friends but instead you find yourself alone in a room with Jimin.

“Wait, what? I could’ve sworn I just left this room 2 minutes ago,” you mumble.

“Yeah, they just left, and I needed the room to myself after for a moment.”

Couldn’t they have waited a whole two minutes? “Is it because of Sierra?”

You needed to learn to shut up sometimes. Maybe just apologize for disturbing him and go on to find your friends? Instead, you set the contents in your hands down and turn to face him.

“Not exactly.” He leans back, tilting his head upwards before continuing. “I just don’t understand why everybody looks at me like I’m the one always fucking up. I’m tired of seeing that look in their eyes.”

You stay silent for the next few seconds, not knowing what to say. “So that’s your story then, huh?” is all you manage to say.

He laughs as he pulls his hands down his face, like he could just wipe his frustration away. “Yeah, I guess. But I thought you didn’t care?”

He always has this tongue-tied effect on you. You never know what to say next, but you also find yourself on the brink of overflowing with countless words. You decide to completely ignore his question.

“Maybe it’s because you unconsciously put up this front and it makes others think you like being this way. Like playing with girls’ feelings is your favourite pastime,” you offer.

“Is that what you think?”

What’s with all his questions? You sigh because you know yourself and you know what’s about to come from you next.

“I think you have a way of making people around you feel like they matter more than they do. And that allows for people to take what they can and run with it, when in reality, there isn’t much else to it. Simply put, I think that causes you to be misunderstood,” you suggest.

You’ve only spent a week’s worth of classes overhearing whispers of his life, and here you go writing a whole essay for him.

“Have you ever felt that way before? Seemed like it comes from personal experience.”

You didn’t think he’d pick up on the little things you tried so hard to concede. You look at him, a little vulnerable and a little defensively but you’re slightly taken aback when he looks at you like he actually cares. It takes everything in you to dismiss the way he’s looking at you right now, as if your souls spoke the same language.

“Who doesn’t feel misunderstood in this world?” is all you choose to leave it at.

“I’m sorry you feel that way, I wish it was better.” He’s pushing himself off the bed, you notice his shirt is partially unbuttoned now. He makes his way over to you, and somehow you feel so much smaller in front of him than you did with Eunwoo.

It’s not his collarbones that glisten in the dimly lit room that has your mind in a haze, but the way you can tell that he aches to hold you. Like he wishes he could be there for you, and he doesn’t even know you yet. But that’s what he’s got wrong, he can’t keep you from getting hurt if he was going to be the cause of it himself. You can tell he was going to be your downfall, you always could.

He brings one hand to the door for balance while he leans into you, his lips just an inch away from yours. You’re not drunk yet you stand with your back to the door feeling intoxicated. He smelt like floral and citrus, reminding you of a picnic in a field. How could a boy like him also smell pretty?

You avoid his eyes at all costs, choosing to focus on the way his collarbones peaked out from underneath. Your body was overheating, you realize, when Jimin brings his other hand to your waist, slowly pushing you further back into the door. Your breath hitches in reaction as you aim to process what was happening. His hand drops lower, bunching up the material of your skirt to push it to the side.

“Fuck this, why do they even bother with slits?” he whispers.

“I don’t know, easy access?” you guess.

“I would argue stylistic choice but sure, if you insist.”

You look away in embarrassment, hoping he couldn’t see how red you turned. Yeah, you should probably stick to not giving him direct answers.

Although your bare leg was exposed to the cold air of the room, your skin was searing hot to the touch. You could especially tell because when Jimin places his warm hand on your thigh, he somehow felt cooler. You finally let out a breath you were holding when his fingers trace your skin, even his touches were soft and pretty. The metal around his fingers cools your skin at the places it glides across. He stops at your hip, grazing his thumb over and across the string of your underwear, and it only makes your body burn like ember for him.

He leans further in, his lips lightly brush yours, but he refrains from moving them. You look back up to him but you find his gaze settled on your lips, like he has longed to kiss you all this while. He finally moves closer, hoping to catch your lips in his but you immediately turn your face away from him. His lips find your jaw instead and unexpectedly, Jimin’s hand digs into your hip a little harsher. You squeeze your eyes shut in reaction while his lips start to leave a trail of kisses down your jaw. I should stop. Only a passing thought that was as you tilt your head when the bridge of his nose is nestled below your ear. His kisses become more like licks as his tongue sweeps your skin with each movement of his lips down your neck.

You let out a whimper when he brings to suck a little harder on your skin. Bad idea. His hand moves to your neck, fingers wrapping around your jaw. He tilts your head, forcing you to face him while applying light pressure to keep you from moving in any way he didn’t want you to. He pauses for a moment too long before leaning in to kiss you.

“I can’t… I-I shouldn’t,” you stutter.

“You can’t or you shouldn’t?” He pulls your hips towards his.

“I shouldn’t…” you attempt to repeat yourself.

“And why is that?”

“You’re drunk, I wouldn’t want to take advantage of that. Nor would I want to wake up remembering this moment only to realize you wouldn’t retain a single moment.”

How you managed to speak coherently is beyond you.

“You’re a different kind, aren’t you?” There’s a glint to his eyes when he speaks now. The Jimin you saw a few minutes ago, replaced.

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“I’m not drunk, trust me. I can handle my liquor.” His voice is darker as if it would do you wrong to question his words.

“What about that girl from class?” You try throwing up an excuse hoping that something will stick. You’re sure that you can’t bring yourself to stop this, not here and not now.

“What about her?” he follows up.

“Listen, I really don’t want to get caught in the middle of that. It’s not really my thing.”

He scoffs. “So, you think I’m cheating?”

“I wouldn’t know if you are, but I don’t want to take the risk.”

His hands come down on your waist, holding you up against the door. Your legs wrap around his hips almost like reflex. You’re already wet and you know he can feel it, especially with your skirt out of the way. The only material remaining between the both of you is his pants. Couldn’t he have been wearing jeans at least? It was embarrassing, to say the least.

But the only thing that kept you going was how hard he felt underneath you. Rocking your hips back and forth, your wetness stains his pants, making it easier to feel more of him. He begins to slowly move his hips upwards in response, causing you to burry your face in his neck. You fling your arm around his shoulders, lightly grabbing at his hair. Your frantic grinding causes you to moan into his ears. At this, he holds you by your waist, pulling you into him as you unwrap your legs to support your body.

“What are you doing?” you ask.

“It’s not really cheating if we’re clothed though, is it?” he teases.

“Jimin, no. We are not doing this.”

“I like how you speak for the both of us, but I was only teasing. Just because I get away with things doesn’t mean I lie to do so. You will come to see that I’m quite honest.”

“A simple ‘kidding’ would have sufficed-”

Without another moment wasted, Jimin’s lips find your collarbone, leaving a wet and sloppy trail of kisses as he starts to slip your straps off your shoulder. You hit the foot of the bed as Jimin leans into you, pushing the both of you on to it. Your back is flush with the bed. He places his thigh in between your legs, causing you to grab him by the shirt to pull him on to you, as you ached to feel him again. He’s now on top of you, and his thigh is right where you wanted it to be, placing the right amount of pressure for you to rub yourself on him, shamelessly. Your hands come up to unbutton his shirt while he leans in to kiss you. You feel his lips on yours and you indulge in it for only a moment before you move underneath him, bringing yourself to sit back up.

The sudden change in your actions causes Jimin to search your eyes. To study your body.

“Is it because of him?”

“Who?”

“That Eunwoo guy.”

Eunwoo was the farthest thing from your mind right now. But you couldn’t let him find that out.

“I don’t know. Maybe it’s better if we didn’t,” you say breathlessly.

The softness on Jimin’s face fades as he pulls himself off the bed to fix his clothes. You mirror him, after which you attempt to grab your phone off the floor when you see a crumbled but folded sheet of paper. You reach for it just as he does, and you pull your hand away aiming to avoid any sort of contact.

“This, uh, this is actually yours from class that day,” he says as he holds out a paper filled with sketches and jargon.

“You’ve had this all week?” You look at him like this was life’s biggest betrayal. It’s not his fault for finding it but you can’t help but be a little annoyed with Tally for not being thorough enough.

“Sorta, I wasn’t sure if it was yours until I saw you replicating it in class yesterday,” he says.

“Did you look at it?”

“How else did you think I knew you were trying to replicate it, y/n?” He looks at you like you’re the dumbest smart person he’s known.

“You were the last person meant to see this,” you whisper subconsciously, grabbing it as you leave the room. The door falls shut behind you and you leave all the events of this night behind you.

Glancing at your phone screen, you read 4 missed calls and 9 texts. All from Tally and Eunwoo trying to figure out where you were.

You unlock it, typing: “Not feeling too good, I’ll see you guys later. Have fun for me.” You head back to your apartment, a little cold and a little confused.

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imkylotrash · 4 years

Text

What Goes Around

Pairing: Hardin Scott x reader

Request: Could I please request an imagine/fic with Hardin Scott x Reader and basically Hardin of course has his bad boy reputation but this intrigues the reader. She is his complete opposite and finds his rudeness quite funny. Hardin is a little too mean to her one time and makes her cry. It doesn’t occur to Hardin that she likes him and by that point he feels like he has lost his chance to get to know her because of his.. ‘wicked’ charm? You can choose the ending. Anonymous

Tagging: @bitchwhytho @music-of-melody

He’s watching you give your coffee order and it makes you smile. Everywhere you go, you seem to run into each other. At first, you’d just steal glances then go your separate ways but then it turned into “hello”. He made the first move and asked if you should have your coffee together one day. Ever since than you’d made polite conversation when you ran into each other and you had to admit that something intrigued you about the tattooed boy who refused to care about anyone other than himself. You couldn’t exactly relate to his perspective on life but you wanted to know more, to understand the boy who considered the world a cruel place rather than an opportunity to happy days.

“This seat taken?” you ask standing with a hot cup of coffee in one hand and a book in the other. The “Red Queen” series have become something of an obsession for you after finishing the first book. You never thought you’d stray from the classics but lately, YA books had been catching your eye.

“I see you’re still on the third book,” he smiles and in the same moment letting you know how he feels about YA books. You don’t take it too hard considering he’s not even willing to admit his love for books for anyone other than you.

“I’m taking my time and enjoying the words.” You have a tendency to get too invested and rush through a book to get to the ending meaning you miss a lot of the little Easter eggs along the way. You’re trying to change that.

“Hey, no judgement from me.” He’s lying but it’s a cute lie so you’ll allow it. Once you’ve finished your coffee, you stand up grabbing your things. You have exactly ten minutes before your class start but you like to get there early in case you need to do some last-minute preparations. Hardin remains seated and you remain neutral in regards to his lack of motivation when it comes to college.

I’ll be going classes now. Want to come?” Okay, maybe not that neutral. He shakes his head smiling and you know what that means. It takes three days before you run into him again. This time at the library where you reach for the same book which sounds completely absurd and something that would only happen in one of your books. It’s a cute moment though.

“I guess great minds think alike,” you say and he scoffs.

“Please. You wish you were as clever as me.” He offers you the book about to sit down when he spots some of his friends outside. You know he’s been a little vague about who you are considering just how different you are to them and frankly, you don’t mind. Hardin is an interesting character because there’s more to him than just the casual alcoholic teen while the people he surrounds himself with at those frat parties really don’t have much else going on for them. You went one time and you’d never been more bored in your life.

“I should go,” he says Within minutes he’s out the door walking in the direction away from his “friends”. After that you don’t spot him for a while or maybe he’s avoiding you to avoid the questions his friends will inevitable have. Either way, you find yourself missing his sarcastic comments. You hadn’t realised just how much of an impression he’d made on you until he wasn’t around. But he comes back to you eventually.

“Hey,” he says when he spots you at the coffee house.

“I thought you’d moved city,” you tease pushing out the chair across from you with your foot. He sits down sliding a book across the table.

“As an apology,” he grins. You turn the book over to see the cover and you can’t help but smile.

“You remembered.” One of the first conversations between you and Hardin had been about ecocriticism and a book called “The Road” that you’d borrowed from the library more times than you could count. You’d discussed the topic in class where your professor had recommended this book and now Hardin had gotten it for you.

“You wouldn’t shut up about the book for at least five hours. How could I not?” He shrugs it off like it’s no big deal but it still means a lot to you. Now you could read the book whenever you felt like it. And he’d gotten the original cover rather than the movie cover. It would’ve been the perfect gift if his friends hadn’t shown up and ruined everything. You see the change in him the second they enter the coffee house.

“Hardin, who’s this?” Jace asks with hungry eyes making you feel incredibly uncomfortable.

“Just a friend,” Hardin offers not wanting to give any information to these people.

“Sure, friend. Do you feel the same way, honey?” Jace asks making the rest of the guys snicker. Before you have a chance to answer, Hardin opens his mouth and ruins everything.

“Yes, friend. I mean look at her. Not exactly my type, is it? I mean, could it get anymore vanilla?” This earns him a high five from one of the guys but it cracks your heart. You’ve never thought much about your close or the way you looked because you thought the inside counted a hell of a lot more than the outside. But hearing that the idea of being with you seemed so ludicrous hurt more than you liked to admit.

“I should get going.” You don’t look at Hardin when you leave and you don’t bring the book with you. If this is how he thinks of you then you don’t want anything from him. And it’s not even the fact that he considers you a friend. If that’s all it was, you’d be fine. It’s how easy it was for him to degrade you that really hurt. You tell yourself you won’t cry but it’s a lost battle as you head home. Unfortunately, you don’t reach home before he catches up to you.

“Leave me alone, Hardin,” you say picking up the pace. You’re determined to reach your apartment without stopping but of course, you can’t help yourself when it’s Hardin.

“Are you mad at me?”

“Mad at you? Of course, I’m mad at you!” you yell not caring who hears you at this point.

“You of all people should realise what it’s like to be judged on the way you look. I like the way I look and I absolutely refuse to let you make me feel bad about it!” You don’t care if he said it because of his friends or not, it’s the fact that it came to him so easily. That means he’s thought it before regardless of the situation at the coffee house.

“It was a joke!” he yells back opting for defensive rather than just apologise. You’re not doing this. You turn around and this time he doesn’t follow you. It’s weeks before you dare return to the coffee house. You don’t want to meet him again. Instead you dive head first into the universe of Jane Austen thinking he could’ve been your Mr. Darcy with his sour attitude and soft spot for you but it didn’t turn out that way. But your need for good coffee eventually win over your fear of seeing him again. The plan is in, order, pay and leave. It’s just not that simple once you’re inside.

“You forgot this.” He places “The Road” in front of you as you’re waiting for your coffee. You can’t believe he’s held onto to it since that day. You figured he would’ve just chucked it in the bin.

“I’m really sorry for what I said. It was rude and thoughtless. You deserve better.” It’s a good apology but you can’t help but think what the insult will be the next time his friends catch you together.

“You’re right. I deserve better.” You get your coffee and head outside.

“Throw me a bone here. I said I was sorry.” Of course, Hardin follows you outside refusing to let this go.

“Hardin, you’re only sorry because I called you out on it. You don’t actually care that it hurt me.” He’s not the first guy who thought he could walk all over you and he won’t be the last but you refuse to accept that treatment. You deserve a lot better than that.

“I’m sorry because it hurt you. I didn’t think you’d read so much into it,” he defends himself making it clear to you that it’s a pointless discussion. He’s not going to understand why what he said was hurtful despite his own appearance and the comments he’s received.

“How could I not? I’m sitting there thinking we might have a shot and then you pull the rug out from under me. I’m not playing these games with you.”

“What?” You don’t bother repeating yourself instead using this moment of shock to hurry away. You manage to avoid him for another week before he corners you on campus.

“You can’t just throw something like that out in the world and then leave. It’s been going round and round in my head.” He has a hand on each side of you leaning against the wall. It’s effective for keeping you in place and distracting you from why you’re actually upset with him.

“I never thought you’d like me like that. Shit, I would’ve done things very differently if I ever thought I had a chance.” This time you’re the one in shock. You didn’t think he’d put so much thought into what you said last time.

“What would you have done differently?” Despite vowing to yourself that you’re done with Hardin, you find yourself curious once again. This bad boy persona with a loving man hidden inside seems like an impossible paradox.

“I would’ve kept you well clear of those idiots from the frat house. Bought you flowers maybe. Taken you to dinner. Bought you a hell of lot more books.” You don’t want to forgive him but it’s hard to think when he’s this close to you.

“I can start now if you’d like.” He places a hand on your cheek and his touch gives you chills. You inhale sharply telling yourself not to give into him but your body has already thrown in the white towel. He leans down stopping inches from your lips.

“I really am sorry. It won’t happen again.” Instead of answering, you lean up closing the gap between you. It’s the first kiss but definitely not the last.

#hardin scott x reader #hardin scott imagine #hardin scott blurb #hardin scott after #hardin scott gif #hardin scott #after gif #after imagine #after blurb #After movie #after we collided #after we collided blurb #after we collided imagine #awc imagine #awc gif #awc blurb #awc

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justcourttee · 4 years

Text

And They Were Roommates-Pt 4

The weekend flew by and before Marinette knew it, she was on her way to her first final that Tuesday. She spent the rest of Sunday and Monday avoiding Damian, choosing to barricade herself in her bedroom surrounded by textbooks.

“When was the American Revolution?”

“From 1775 to 1783, give me something a little harder Tikki.”

The kwamii huffed as the two of them sat huddled in the back of the shuttle bus.

“I’m trying Marinette, I’m reading straight from your textbook!”

Marinette giggled, stroking Tikki’s head with one finger.

“Thank you for your help Tikki. I know I’m ready for this test, but I still feel stressed for some reason.

“You know Marinette, you should ask Damian to study with you in the Spring! He’s a history major too right?”

The girl rolled her eyes, shaking her head.

“I think I’ll take my chances with you Tikki.”

The bus halted to a stop in front of the Student Union as Marinette jumped up, closing her backpack in the process. She walked across campus, breathing in the brisk winter air, trying to calm her nerves. She reached for the door when a tingle spread across her wrist. Pulling up the sleeve of her coat, Marinette peered down with a smile.

“Good Luck today Angel, even though I know you don’t need it.”

The brisk air numbed her skin, but she could feel the warmth spreading in her chest. She moved indoors before uncapping the pen holding her bun in place. Soft curls framed her face as she scribbled on her wrist, making small steps in the direction of the closest bathroom.

“Thank you mon amour, I’ll write you in a few hours.”

She stood over the sink, watching intently as she waited for his handwriting to disappear before she washed away hers. Grabbing a paper towel, she exited the bathroom, drying her wrist furiously as she raced to the classroom. Tossing the towel in the nearest trash bin, she barely looked up before colliding into a still object, crashing to the floor.

“Ow,” she rubbed her head, looking up at the man who barely moved.

“Are you always such a klutz?” Damian reached out his hand, a smirk stretched across his face.

“You.” Marinette narrowed her eyes, swatting his hand away. With great effort, she pushed herself up, crossing her arms to stare down her roommate.

“What are you doing here?”

“I could ask you the same thing.”

“I asked first.”

Damian scoffed, rolling his eyes as he turned back toward the entrance to Professor Lupez’ classroom

“I’m here to take my final for American History.”

“You weren’t in my class this whole semester. Did you take it online?”

“Nosy and perspective, your soulmate must be overwhelmed with joy.”

His smirk returned to his face as he watched the smaller girl turn bright red. Marinette pushed past him and into the classroom, ignoring his jabs of laughter. Taking her usual seat, she exhaled slowly, trying to push away her interaction with the boy. There was no way she was going to let Damian Al Ghul mess up her perfect GPA.

Minutes later, Damian entered the room chatting idly with the professor as if they had known each other for years, his smirk still evident on his face. Marinette felt her blood start to boil again. Professor Lupez was her favorite teacher on this entire campus, there was no way that he could take that from her. She stood up to intervene when she felt a light pressure in her back.

Sitting back down, Marinette let out a soft groan before reaching into her backpack to grab her pencils. Tikki reached up, offering them to her while shaking their head. The kwamii made a motion to inhale deeply and let it go and much to their delight, Marinette did just that.

“Alright class, any last minute questions before I hand out the most important grade of this semester?”

Professor Lupez glanced around the room, her eyes landing briefly on Marinette’s, offering the girl a warm smile.

“Well then, if everyone is so prepared, I wish you all the best of luck. As always, cheating results in a 0 and please, try to place your tests in one neat pile. I know you are not savages!”

Marinette exhaled one last time as her seatmate handed her the pile of tests. Picking the one from the top, she passed on the rest, risking a look at the boy seated two rows down from her. He was already on the second page, his face stretching into a smug. She looked back at her own test, a smug expression of her own forming.

This test would be a breeze.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Walking out of the classroom, Marinette breathed a sigh of relief. She had finished the test in a mere twenty minutes, shocking many of her classmates when she drifted past them to turn it in. She pulled out her phone to send a text to Chloe when she heard the voice she was dreading.

“Took you long enough. I thought for a second that you could be on my level of intellect, but your performance proved otherwise.”

“What are you still doing here Damian?” She let out a sigh, averting her eyes to the ground.

“I thought we could walk home together, after all, we do live together.”

Her eyes darted up as she crossed her arms, watching Damian with a renewed curiosity.

“Yeah, with Adrien and Chloe. Don’t make it sound like we’re a couple.”

“As if you could earn my respect Dupen-Chang.”

She frowned at his smirk, unable to tell if he was joking, unable to tell if she cared.

“Yeah, well, let’s go then.”

She didn’t wait for an answer as she pushed past him, exiting the building, leaving him to trail behind her in the cold winter afternoon.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The walk home was awkward to say the least, neither one saying much. Marinette tried to ask him about his family and his home, but he brushed her off, declaring that he did not like the idea of small talk to fill in the silence. She jiggled her key into the doorknob, pushing lightly to break through the slight ice that had formed around the frame.

“Do you want some-”

She didn’t even finish her sentence before his bedroom door slammed, leaving her alone in the kitchen. Marinette let out a sigh, unzipping her backpack for Tikki to fly out.

“Well, I guess hot chocolate for one then.”

Tikki let out a giggle as the girl pulled down a mug. She placed the mixture of chocolate and milk on the stove when her phone began to buzz. At the sight of the caller id, a warm smile stretched across her face.

“Maman! How are you?”

“How am I? How are you?! Your first final was today! Tell me, will I have another history buff in this family like your grandfather?”

Marinette shook her head, trying to keep the laughter from bubbling out.

“I’m considering a double major Maman, but you know I love designing and nothing can change that.”

“I know sweetie, I just want to make sure you’re exploring your options! That’s what college is all about!”

“I know Maman, but I’m exploring business, that’s exploring enough.”

Her mother chuckled, sending a warm feeling straight to the girl’s toes. The sound of bubbling liquid caught her attention as she moved to turn off the stove, ladling the chocolate into her mug.

“Maman, I love you, but you don’t usually risk an international call unless it’s something urgent. What’s going on?”

“Oh sweetie, it’s nothing bad. It’s just that your father and I were talking about your winter break. We know you’ll be busy working on your portfolio for Professor Brookes, but if there was an opportunity for us to fly over for Christmas, would you want us too?”

“Oh my god, are you serious? Maman I would love that! Both Adrien and Chloe will be flying back so I’ll have plenty of room!”

The women chatted excitedly for several minutes before they finally agreed to hang up, neither wanting to pay the phone bill that they were wracking up. Swirling her hot chocolate in her mug, Marinette felt on cloud 9. It was the inspiration she was waiting for to get back to her designs and she wasn’t going to waste it.

Tag List:

@damianette-is-life @ladybug-182 @fusser90 @thestressmademedoit @dast218 @thezestywalru @jardimazul @olynix @dorkus-minimus @xahriia @kris-pines04 @urbanpineapplefarmer @moonlightstar64 @itsmeevie01 @little-lady-bird @alexandriamw @lozzybowe @emmdaenovice @loysydark @toodaloo-kangaroo @jessigurl-design @aegyobutpsycho2 @stark-morgoona @tis-i-beanbandit @rebecarojas07 @abrx2002 @ash-amg @loveswifi @heaven428 @dreamykitty25 @marinettepotterandplagg @smolplantmum @clumsy-owl-4178 @books-and-left-behind-journals

#daminette #maribat #roommates

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lifeofkaze · 4 years

Text

An Art of Balance #6

A/N: If anyone’s interested, the perfume Lizzie is wearing is one of my all-time favourites, Aqua di Gioia by Giorgio Armani. It’s really poorly described here because my olfactory recognition doesn’t go beyond ‘good’ and ‘bad’, but well. It’s divine though. Also, bear with me if sth astrological is wrong, this stuff is complicated! Katriona Cassiopeia (aka KC) belongs to my lovely friend @kc-needs-coffee

Word Count: ~ 2.100

______________________________________________________________

Chapter 6: A New Perspective

As it turned out, Orion’s decision to name Everett Hufflepuff’s new Beater had been the right one. He still had a way to go, but he immediately fell in line with the rest of the team. What he lacked in precision, he made up in strength.

Orion had taking his individual training on himself. As the team’s captain, he saw it as his personal responsibility to ensure every one of his teammates was able to reach his full potential. Everett was a fast learner, but it would take him a few more sessions to even be remotely able to hold a candle to the Ravenclaw Beaters.

Rath and Cassiopeia had been a well attuned team for many years now, both as skilled a Beater as they came. They would need any protection against them they could get, and the match against Ravenclaw was approaching fast.

Although Orion wasn’t the type of person to let his mind be clouded by worries, he had to admit he wasn’t entirely sure they could get Everett into proper form in time. He had been voicing his concerns to Lizzie the other day, during one of their tutoring sessions. If anyone knew what it took to become a Beater in a short amount of time it was her.

Lately, Orion had found himself looking forward to their meetings in the greenhouse, despite his already tightly packed schedule. It was refreshing to discuss their team matters with someone that didn’t flood him with a multitude of statistics for a change. Lizzie had a different approach to things than him, but they weren’t polar opposites like he and Skye. Exchanging views with her had provided him with a new impulse more than once.

In fact, he had come to enjoy her presence in general, even more so than before. They had always been friends but his knowledge about her had pretty much begun and ended at the Quidditch pitch. Seeing her outside team meetings and practise had allowed him to get to know other sides of her. He’d had no idea Lizzie had been part of the duelling club until last year. Or that Arithmancy was one of her favourite subjects. Or that she used a perfume smelling distinctively of jasmine and mint.

Orion had a harder time bonding with her friend Rowan. He hadn’t had any points of contact with her before he had started tutoring them. Now, several weeks later, he still knew hardly anything about her. She seemed to be exceptionally smart, but also equally as shy. Most of the time she would consult her textbook about the plants he tried to teach them about, while Lizzie paid it no mind, listening to his explanations instead.

Orion couldn’t help his impression that Rowan was struggling with his unconventional style of teaching. He didn’t refer to books more than he had to, rather letting his instinct and experience guide him.

Having trained with him for years, Lizzie knew his way of conveying knowledge was not always straightforward. Rowan, however, had a hard time letting go of protocol. She was clinging to the academic theory as if her life depended on it. Following the rules could help with a lot of problems, but she would never master the delicate nuances advanced Herbology had to offer, if she wasn’t willing to tread paths unknown to her.

“And what exactly is the difference between dried foxglove petals and desiccated foxglove petals?”

McNully snapped him out of his thoughts and back to where they were sitting in the Great Hall. It was study time and most of the students were gathered at their House tables, brooding over their homework.

They had been discussing their latest Potions essay, covering the effects sourcing methods had on the quality of ingredients.

“That is what we are supposed to illustrate, I believe.” Orion dipped his quill into the ink bottle they were sharing and tried to pick up where his wandering thoughts had let him off. His eyes wandered casually across the other Hufflepuff students lining their table.

It lingered where Skye and Lizzie were sitting. Lizzie was rapidly flicking through the pages of her textbook with a puzzled expression. Skye was talking insistently at her, looking equally as bewildered.

Several heads shot up as Lizzie audibly slammed her book shut and clambered off the bench. When Skye made no move to follow her, she jerked the other girl up off her seat and motioned with her head towards where he and McNully were sat.

They quietly walked towards the head of the Hufflepuff table. Seeing them approach, McNully reached for his wheelchair that was blocking the way. He moved it aside to allow the girls to join them. Orion smiled.

“What can we help you with?”

Wordlessly, Lizzie held up her copy of Unfogging the Future and slid into a seat between Murphy and him. She reopened the page she had been examining before and gave a frustrated sigh.

“I cannot tell you how much I hate Divination, I really can’t. You’re good at this, aren’t you?”

Orion supressed a smile. “So I am told. What bothers you in particular?”

“It’s those bloody birthstones,” Skye explained. “No matter how often we go over it, Lizzie and I always come to different results and we can’t find the mistake.”

They handed him their notes and Orion quickly gave them a check before returning them.

“That is because both choices are correct. There is more than one birthstone for each of the zodiac signs. You both chose the right stone for the right sign, but in different parts of the time span covered.”

Skye groaned in frustration, earning her a chiding glance from Professor Flitwick, who was supervising them today. “What do you mean, more than one? Why can’t this stuff be straightforward for once?”

“Everyone is different and such is reflected in the stones fortifying our inner strengths. Why should there be so little birthstones when there are so many traits to represent?”

Both girls looked at him with blank expressions.

Patiently, he flipped the pages to one of the star charts at the back of the book. “The astrological year is divided into the twelve zodiac signs. Each zodiac sign is subdivided into three decades, meaning a set of ten days. There are additional factors to consider, but simply put, there are three birthstones for each sign, representing one decade each. That is why you come to different conclusions, you didn’t factor in the time of the month.”

He contemplated telling them about the stones meant to counteract each signs weaknesses. But seeing Skye pinching the bridge of her nose, while was Lizzie trying to process what he had just said, muttering “I hate Divination” under her breath, he decided against it. Better not too much at once.

“How do you know all this nonsense?” Skye was shaking her head in disbelief.

“I know all this because it is explained in the introduction of the chapter you two apparently weren’t reading too diligently.” He turned the pages back to the beginning and pointed at the paragraph on the first page.

Lizzie’ cheeks flushed a bright read as she quickly scanned the text. “I can’t believe I overlooked this.” Embarrassed, she quickly snatched the book out of Orion’s hands and got up. “Thanks for helping anyway.”

They made their way back to their places, the scent of jasmine and mint lingering behind. Orion was always glad if he could help a friend. A few seats down the table, Lizzie was discussing what he had just told them with Skye. He thought back on what Penny and Murphy had said on the train ride to Hogwarts a few weeks earlier.

Lizzie really had changed a lot. She seemed to be standing taller, an air of effortless confidence around her. The blush on her cheeks had made her look really pretty, reminding him of how the rush of the wind brought the colour to her face when she was flying. She was moving differently as well, more graceful and fluently, her hips swaying ever so slightly with every step she took. He had never noticed her hips swaying like that before.

McNully nudged his shoulder. “Uhm, Orion… if you don’t want to rewrite your whole essay, I’d move my quill if I was you.”

He snapped out of it and looked down at his parchment. The ink was dripping from the tip of his quill, forming a large black puddle at the end of his last sentence that was quickly spreading onto the rest of his half-finished essay.

Orion cursed under his breath, immediately drawing his wand to vanish the excess ink. Fortunately not too much of his work was ruined.

McNully raised his eyebrows. “Such a strong language, my friend. I have only heard you curse three times, so far. One time was when you crashed your broom into the commentary box and broke your wrist, the second time when you forgot the time while broom balancing and almost missed your Defence Against the Dark Arts O.W.L. exam and the third time when you burned yourself on your cauldron and spilled Wiggenweld Potion all over Professor Snape. This reaction is 87,9 % surprising.”

He felt the heat creeping up his neck. McNully was right, he wasn’t easily enticed to displaying his emotions verbally. He hadn’t meant to let himself slip like that.

Choosing not to answer his curious friend, he committed himself to restoring the missing part of his essay. But McNully wouldn’t let it pass like that.

He was nodding in the direction of Lizzie. “I wonder if she knows how much attention she is attracting.”

Orion gripped his quill a little tighter, concentrating on finishing his sentence. He fought the urge to follow McNully’s gaze.

“Our friend has a captivating personality, for sure. But would you mind lifting the veil of ignorance from my eyes and tell me how you reached such a conclusion?”

For a moment, McNully smirked knowingly before he directed Orion’s attention over to where their roommates were sitting. He could easily make out what McNully had been referring to. Everett was eyeing the girls up without even trying to conceal it.

“Him, of course. He’s been checking Lizzie out ever since she came over to us.” He smiled innocently at him. “Why, who did you think I was talking about?”

Orion’s brow furrowed in concern. He didn’t like the predatory look on Everett’s face. This guy had somewhat of a reputation.

“Yeah, I don’t like the looks he’s giving her either,” McNully echoed his unspoken thoughts with a scowl. He leaned closer to him, putting his elbow on Orion’s shoulder in conspiratorial way. “I think we should do something about it, don’t you? And by ‘we’, I obviously mean ‘you’.”

Shaking off McNully’s hand, Orion gave him a disapproving look. “And why would I do that? He is our new Beater if you don’t recall.”

“For the sake of the team, of course!”

McNully started reciting his calculations. “I’d put the chance of him going for our little Chaser prodigy at roughly 80 %. There are some variables unaccounted for, but I’d say the chances of Lizzie falling for him lie at something around 54 %. Which would affect the team’s dynamic gravely. And we can’t have that decreasing our- I mean, your odds on winning the Quidditch Cup.”

Orion blew onto his parchment until the ink had properly dried. “You talk as if he was actually hitting her up. All he did was looking at her.”

And there was certainly nothing wrong with looking.

“Lizzie can fend for herself if need be. Besides, who am I to interfere with the course the heart is deciding to take.”

McNully looked at him as if he had lost his mind. “Mate… I don’t think the heart has much to with it if you get my drift. Seriously, do something.”

“Don’t worry, I will.” He stood up and handed Professor Flitwick his work of the day.

McNully raised one eyebrow at him. “And what would that be?”

Orion gathered his strewn books and notes. “Finding balance inside and outside of my mind, my dear friend. See you at dinner.”

#art of balance #lizzie jameson #orion amari #orion x mc #orion amari x mc #hphm #hogwarts mystery #skye parkin #murphy mcnully #quidditch #quidditch squad #the quidditch squad

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bensk · 3 years

Text

Be curious. Be humble. Be useful.

I was invited to give the annual Taub Lecture for graduating Public Policy students at the University of Chicago, my alma mater and the department from which I graduated. This is what I came up with.

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I am incredibly grateful and honored to be here tonight. The Public Policy program literally changed my life.

My name is Ben Samuels-Kalow, my pronouns are he/him/his. I’m a 2012 Public Policy graduate, and I will permit myself one “back in my day” comment: When I was a student here, the “Taub Lecture” were actual lectures given by Professor Taub in our Implementation class. I’ve spent the last nine years teaching in the South Bronx. For the past two years, I have served as Head of School at Creo College Prep, a public charter school that opened in 2019.

I was asked tonight to tell you a bit about my journey, and the work that I do. My objection to doing this is that there is basically nothing less interesting than listening to a white man tell you how he got somewhere, so I'll keep it brief. I grew up in New York City and went to a public high school that turned out Justice Elena Kagan, Chris Hayes, Lin-Manuel Miranda, among many others…none of whom were available tonight.

We, on this Zoom, all have one thing in common — we have been very, very close to graduating from the University of Chicago. I have never sat quite where you sit. I didn’t graduate into a pandemic. But the truth is that everyone graduates into a crisis. The periods of relative ease, the so-called “ends of history”, even the end of this pandemic, are really matters of forced perspective. This crisis isn’t over. Periods of relative peace and stability paper over chasms of structural inequality.

You went to college with the people who will write the books and go on the talk shows and coin the phrases to describe our times. You could write that book. You could go into consulting and spend six weeks at a time helping a company figure out how to maximize profits from their Trademark Chasm Expanding Products.

You could also run into the chasm.

What is the chasm?

It is the distance between potential and opportunity. It is a University on the South Side of Chicago with a student body that is 10% Black and 15% Latinx, with a faculty that is 65% white.

It is eight Black students being admitted to a top high school in New York City...in a class of 749.

What is the chasm?

The chasm is that in our neighborhood in The Bronx, where I’m standing right now, 1 in 4 students can read a book on their grade level, and only 1 in 10 will ever sit in a college class.

It is maternal mortality and COVID survival rates. The chasm is generational wealth and payday loans.

It is systemic racism and misogyny.

It is the case for activism and reparations.

In my job, the chasm is the distance between the creativity, brilliance, and wit that my students possess, and the opportunities the schools in our neighborhood provide.

In the zip code in which I grew up in New York City, the median income is $122,169. In the zip code where I have spent every day working since I graduated from UChicago, the median income is $30,349. The school where I went to 7th grade and this school where next year we will have our first 7th grade are only a 15 minute drive apart.

In my first quarter at UChicago, I joined the Neighborhood Schools Program, and immediately fell in love with working in schools. I joined NSP because a friend told me how interesting she found the work. I’d done some tutoring in high school, and had taught karate since I was 15. I applied, was accepted, and worked at Hyde Park Academy on 62nd and Stony Island in a variety of capacities from 2008 to 2012.

At the time, Hyde Park Academy had one of very few International Baccalaureate programs on the South Side, and every spring, parents would line up out the door of the school to try to get their rising 9th grader in. I worked with an incredible mentor teacher and successive classes of high school seniors whose wit, creativity, and skill would've been at home in the seminars and dorm discussions we all have participated in three blocks north of their high school.

In my work at Hyde Park Academy, I learned the first lesson of three lessons that have shaped my career as a teacher. Be curious. I had been told in Orientation that there were “borders” to the UChicago experience, lines we should not cross. I am forever grateful to the people who told me to ignore that BS. Our entire department is a testimony to ignoring that BS. We ask questions like, why did parents line up for hours to get into what was considered a “failing” high school? Why had no one asked my kids to write poetry before? Why are they more creative and better at writing than most of the kids I went to high school with, but there is only one IB class and families have to literally compete to get in? I learned as much from my job three blocks south of the University as I did in my classes at the University...which is to say, I was learning a LOT, but I had a lot more to learn.

I knew I wanted to be a teacher from my first quarter here. I did my research. The Boston Teacher Residency was the top program in the country, so I applied there. I was a 21 year old white man interested in education, so...I applied to Teach for America. In the early 2010’s, I looked like the default avatar on a Teach for America profile. It was my backup option. I was all in on Boston, and was sure, with four years working in urban schools, a stint at the Urban Education Institute, and, at the time, seven years of karate teaching under my belt, I was a shoe in.

I was rejected from both programs. Which brings me to my second lesson. Be humble. We are destined for and entitled to nothing. There is an aphorism I learned from one of my favorite podcasts, Another Round: "carry yourself with the confidence of a mediocre white man." If you are a mediocre white man, like me, do as much as you can not to be. If you look like me, you live life on the "lowest difficulty setting." This means I need to question my gifts, contextualize my successes, and actively work against systems of oppression that perpetuate inequity.

Over the last two years, I have interviewed over 300 people to work at this school. There are a series of questions that I ask folks with backgrounds like myself:

Have you ever lived in a neighborhood that was majority people of color?

Have you ever worked on a team that was majority people of color?

Have you ever worked for a boss/supervisor/leader who was a person of color?

The vast majority of white folks, myself at 21 included, could not answer “yes” to these three questions. This is disappointing, but I've also lived and worked in two of the most segregated cities on this continent, so it is not surprising. By the time I sat where you’re sitting now, I had learned a lot about education policy and sociology. I'd taken every class that Chad offered at the time. I'd worked at UEI, I'd worked in a South Side high school for four years, and I still thought I was entitled to something. Unlearning doesn't usually happen in a moment, and I certainly didn't realize it at the time, but these rejections were the best thing that has happened to me in my growth as a human.

I moved back home to New York, was accepted to my last-choice teaching program, and started teaching at MS 223: The Laboratory School of Finance & Technology. I ended up teaching there for 5 years. I had incredible mentors, met some of my best friends, started a Computer Science program that’s used as a model at hundreds of schools across New York City…and most importantly, while making copies for Summer School in July of 2015, I met my wife.

All this to say — if you aren’t 100% convinced that what you’re doing next year is Your Thing, keep an open mind…and make frequent stops in the copy room.

I learned that teaching was My Thing. I didn't want to do ed policy research. I got to set education policy, conduct case studies, key informant interviews, run statistical analysis…with 12 year olds. This was the thing I couldn’t stop talking about, reading about, learning about. I really and truly did not care about the “UChicago voices” of my parents and my friends who kept asking what I was going to do next. My answer: teach.

If you look like me, and you teach Computer Science, there are opportunities that come flying your way. I was offered jobs with more prestige, jobs with more pay, jobs far away from the South Bronx. I was offered jobs I would have loved. But I’d learned a third lesson: be useful. If you have a degree from this place, people will always ask you what the next promotion or job is. They will ask "what's next for you" and they will mean it with respect and admiration.

Here’s the thing: teaching was what’s next. “But don’t you want to work in policy?” Teaching is a political act. It is hands-on activism, it is community organizing, it is high-tech optimistic problem-solving and low-tech relationship building. It is the reason we have the privilege of choosing a career, and it is a career worth choosing.

I had internalized what I like to call the Dumbledore Principle: “I had learned that I was not to be trusted with power.” This meant unlearning the very UChicago idea that if you were smart and if you think and talk like we are trained to think and talk at this place, you should be in charge. The best things in my life have come from unlearning that. Learning from mentors to never speak the way I was praised for in a seminar. Learning from veteran teachers how to be a warm demander who was my authentic best self...and more importantly brought out the authentic best self in my students. Being useful isn't the same thing as being in charge…and that is ok.

I believe this deeply. Which is why, when I was offered the opportunity to design and open a school, my first thought was absolutely the hell no. I said to my wife: “I’m a teacher. Dumbledore Principle — we’re supposed to teach, make our classrooms safe and wonderful for our kids.”

I also knew that teaching kids to code wasn’t worth a damn if they couldn’t read and write with conviction, so I started looking for schools that did both — treated kids like brilliant creatives who should learn to create the future AND met them where they were with rigorous coursework that closed opportunity gaps. In our neighborhood, there were schools that did the latter, that got incredible results for kids. Then there was my school, where kids learned eight programming languages before they graduated, but at which only 40% of our kids could read.

We were lauded for this, by the way. 40% was twice the average in our district. We were praised for the Computer Science — the mayor of New York and the CEO of Microsoft visited and met with my students. It felt great. I wasn’t convinced it was useful.

Kids in the neighborhood where I grew up didn’t have to choose between a school that was interesting and a school that equipped them with the knowledge and skills to pursue their own interests in college and beyond. Why did our students have to choose? I delivered this stressed-out existential monologue to my wife that boiled down to this: every kid deserves a school where they were always safe, and never bored. We weren’t working at a school like that. I was being offered a chance to design one. But…Dumbledore principle.

My wife took it all in, looked at me, and said: “You idiot. Dumbledore RAN a school.”

Friends, you deserve a partner like this.

The road to opening Creo College Prep, and the last two years of leading our school as we opened, closed, opened online, finished our first year, moved buildings, opened online again, opened in-person (kind of) and now head into our third year, has reinforced my lessons from teaching — be curious, be humble, be useful. These lessons are about both learning and unlearning. A white guy doing Teach for America at 21 is a stereotype. A white guy starting a charter school is a stereotype with significant capital, wading into complicated political and pedagogical waters. The lessons I learn opening a school and the unlearning I must do to be worthy of the work are not destinations, they are journeys.

Be curious

I didn’t just open a school. Schools are communities, they are institutions, and they are bureaucracies. If you work very, very hard, and with the right people, they become engines that turn coffee and human potential into joy and intellectual thriving capable of altering the trajectory of a child’s life.

First you have to find the right people. I joined a school design fellowship, spent a year visiting 50 high-performing schools across the country, recruited a founding board of smart, committed people who hold me accountable, and spent time in my community learning from families what they wanted in a school. There is studying public policy, and then there is attending Community Board meetings and Community Education Council Meetings, and standing outside of the Parkchester Macy's handing out flyers and getting petition signatures at Christmastime next to the mall Santa.

I observed in schools while writing my BA, and as a teacher, but it was in this fellowship that I learned to “thin slice,” a term we borrowed from psychology that refers to observing a small interaction and finding patterns about the emotions and values of people. In a school, it means observing small but crucial moments — how does arrival work, how are students called on, how do they ask for help in a classroom, how do they enter and leave spaces, how do they move through the hallways, where and how do teachers get their work done — and gleaning what a school values, and how that translates into impact for kids. Here’s how I look at schools:

Does every adult have an unwavering belief that students can, must, and will learn at the highest level?

Do they have realistic and urgent plans for getting every kid there? Are these beliefs and plans clear and held by kids?

Are all teachers strategic, valorizing planning and intellectual nerdery over control or power?

Is the curriculum worthy of the kids?

Can kids explain why the school does things they way they do? Can staff? Can the leader?

If I'm in the middle of teaching and I need a pen or a marker, what do I do? Is that clear?

What’s the attendance rate? How do we follow up on kids who aren’t here?

How organized and thoughtful are the physical and digital spaces?

Are kids seen by their teachers? Are their names pronounced correctly? Do their teachers look like them? Do they make them laugh, think, and revise their answers?

Would I want to work here? Would I send my own kids here?

Be humble

I learned that there are really two distinct organizations that we call “school.” One is an accumulation of talent (student and staff) that happens to be in the same place at the same time, operating on largely the same schedule.

These were the schools I attended. These are schools you got to go to if you got lucky and you were born in a zip code with high income and high opportunity. These are schools where you had teachers who were intellectually curious, and classmates whose learning deficits could be papered over by social capital…and sometimes, straight up capital.

“Accumulation of talent” also describes the schools I worked at. These were schools where if you got lucky and you were extraordinary in your intelligence, determination, support network, and teachers who’d decided to believe in you, you became one of the stories we told. “She got into Cornell.” “That whole English class got into four year colleges.”

Most schools in this country, it turns out, are run like this. I knew all about local control and the limits of federal standards on education and the battles over teacher evaluations and so much other helpful and important context I learned in my PBPL classes. But when thin-slicing a kindergarten classroom in Nashville on my first school visit of the Fellowship, I saw a whole other possibility of what “school” can be.

School can be a special place organized towards a single purpose. One team, one mission. Where the work kids do in one class directly connects to the next, and builds on the prior year. Where kids are treated like the important people they are and the important people they will be, where students and staff hold each other to a high bar, where there is rigor and joy. A place where staff train together so that instead of separate classrooms telling separate stories about how to achieve, there is one coherent language that gives kids the thing they crave and deserve above all else: consistency.

We get up every morning to build a school like that. It’s why my team starts staff training a month before the first day of school. It’s why we practice teaching our lessons so that we don’t waste a moment of our kids’ time. It’s why everyone at our school has a coach, including me, so we can be a better teacher tomorrow than we were today. It’s why we plan engaging, culturally responsive, relevant lessons. It’s how we keep a simple, crucial promise to every family: at this school, you will always be safe, and you will never be bored.

Be useful

Statistically speaking, it is not out of the realm of possibility that several of you will one day be in a position to make big sweeping policy changes. You will have the power to not only write position papers, but to Make Big Plans. I will be rooting for you, but I hope that you won’t pursue Big Plans for the sake of Big Plans.

The architect who designed the Midway reportedly said "make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men's blood." I had that quoted to me in several lectures at this school, and you know what?

It’s bullshit.

I am asking you not to care about scale. Good policy isn’t about scale, it’s about implementation, and implementation requires the right people on the ground. Implementation can scale. The right people cannot. We can Make Big Plans, but every 6th grade math class still needs an excellent math teacher. That's a job worth doing. I could dream about starting 20 schools, but every school needs a leader. That’s a job worth doing. Places like UChicago teach us to ask "what's next" for our own advancement, to do this now so we can get to that later. I learned to ask "what's next" to be as useful as possible to as many kids as I have in front of me.

I hold these two thoughts in my mind:

The educational realities of the South Bronx have a lot more to do with where highways were built in our neighborhood than with No Child Left Behind or charter schools, and require comprehensive policy change that address not only educational inequity, but environmental justice, and systemic racism.

The most useful policy changes I can make right now are to finalize the schedule for our staff work days that start on June 21, get feedback on next year’s calendar from families, and finish hiring the teachers our kids deserve.

I will follow the policy debates of #1 with great interest, but I know where I can be useful, and I’ll wake up tomorrow excited to make another draft of the calendar. I hope you get to work on making your Small Plans, and I will leave you with the secret — or at least the way that worked for me:

Find yourself people who are smarter than you and who disagree with you. Find problems you cannot shut up or stop thinking about. Do what you can’t shut up about with intellect and kindness. Use the privilege and opportunity that we have because we went to this school to make sure that opportunity for others does not require privilege. Run into the chasm.

Be curious, be humble, be useful.

Thank you.

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jellybeanbeing · 4 years

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Avatar: The Last Airbender Book Tag

I recently watched and finished Avatar: The Last Airbender for the first time in my life and it was sooooo good. I wanted to do a book tag to celebrate this event so here we are! This tag was created by Hannah from A Clockwork Reader!

Water:

Katara & Sokka: Best sibling relationship // Declan, Ronan, and Matthew Lynch from The Dreamer trilogy by Maggie Stiefvater

These three are far from perfect, but they are my favorite sibling trio. They are so different from each other but it adds to their dynamic. They can never fully understand each other and the choices they make but they’re there to care for the other when they’re in trouble. Sure, they don’t get along a lot, but not every set of siblings does. One of my favorite things about this trio is that they had a period of time where they hated each other and wanted nothing to do with each other (mainly Declan and Ronan) because of what had happened to their family but overtime, they learn to mend that wound and grow closer together. I just love my angsty boys.

Yue: Favorite star crossed lovers // Emma & Julian from The Dark Artifices series by Cassandra Clare

I know that a lot of people do not like this couple, and that’s valid. I really love this couple though. What can I say? I just love my angsty characters. But really, it’s the yearning and the “will they come out of this situation alive” pain that fuels my love for this couple. Their relationship is filled with so much intensity, and then you add in that factor of “we don’t know if they’ll have a happy ending” and it just hurts, but in a good way. They are strong-willed characters who have so much pain built up inside them and the one thing they so desperately want is each other and to be together but they can’t. Say what you want about this couple, but they are one of my top tier OTPs.

Blood Bending: A book with disturbing/unsettling concept // Thunderhead by Neal Shusterman

It feels odd to choose the second book in the series to talk about, but this book has one scene that almost made me vomit, and that has never ever happened to me before. This entire series’ concept is deeply unsettling because it’s set in a world where technology is so advanced that even death by natural causes has been conquered so people called ‘Scythes’ are tasked to keep the population at bay. Within that world, there is corruption with how Scythes choose to kill their victims. Before I say what I say, just know that I really like this series. Anyway. I have never been more nervous and angry while reading a book and I thought I had reached my limit with book one, but no. Book two was just a fucking treat. The ending was fucked. The buildup to it was fucked. What Goddard did to Tyger was what made me almost vomit, and just thinking about it and Goddard makes me want to rip my head off because what the fuck. I still haven’t read the third book yet, but I will. Soon. Maybe.

Earth:

Toph: A character whose strength surprised you/or surprised the other characters in the book // Kell Maresh from the Shades of Magic series by V.E Schwab

We all know Kell to be a powerful magician, but at the time when I read this, I didn’t really understand how powerful he was capable of being. He’s one of the few Antari in that world so obviously it would make sense that he has a huge amount of power. It wasn’t until the second book when it clicked in my head that Kell has the power to do so much more destruction. In the tournament scenes through Lila’s perspective, I started to see the extent of his powers because of how much he was holding back and it blew my freaking mind.

The Tales of Ba Sing Se: Best short story/poetry collection // none

I have not read a lot of short story/poetry collections that really stand out to me so yeah, none for me.

Kyoshi Warriors: Best warrior character // Helene Aquilla from An Ember in the Ashes series by Sabaa Tahir

I love Helene Aquilla so much. She’s such a badass and it’s great. What I really love about her is that she’s not just a pretty face who wields a sword around. Yes, she’s strong physically and mentally at the beginning of the series, but during the journey she goes on, all of that is broken down until she’s at her most vulnerable. We are constantly seeing the turmoil inside her and it adds so much to her character. She’s far from perfect but those imperfections are what makes her such a strong character.

Fire:

Zuko: Best redemption arc/a redemption arc that should have happened // Matthias Helvar from the Six of Crows duology by Leigh Bardugo

Literally, almost everyone hates him and I understand why but the amount of growth he goes through is one of the best things about his character. Sure, he’s a straight pasty white boy who, on the outside, is boring compared to the other five (or six???) characters but seeing his development from being a bigoted asshole to a more understanding and caring character was something I loved reading about. It takes a lot to unlearn the things you grew up thinking was true and heavily believed in, and to see a different view of the world. I do understand the meaning of his end but there was so much more potential for character to really grow even more than it did and I will forever be bitter.

Iroh: Wisest character // Evelyn Hugo from The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo

Evelyn Hugo is such a great character. She starts from the bottom and then climbs her way to the top by doing things that are considered to be not ethically correct. She’s aware of all of that and yet she feels little to no shame about it because she did what she had to for the dream she wanted. She makes mistakes and has flaws but that never brings down her character. After all of that, she still holds herself up. She went through so much in her life and throughout the book, she provides so much insight on the choices she made and how they affected her.

Azula: Best downfall // Bonnie from The End of the Fucking World S2

I know there’s a comic but I’m going to talk about the Netflix series, and I know it’s not a book but I really wanted to talk about Bonnie and her downfall. Would you call it a downfall? I don’t know really, but I guess I’ll consider it as one. Her downfall was by far the most emotional that I have ever seen/read about. I feel like episode 7 was just a perfect episode to capture Bonnie’s character and the downfall she has. Not to mention that it’s a fucking great episode and it will remain one of my favorites. Bonnie is a character who grew up with a lack of love and has seemingly detached herself from a lot of things and people. I say this because for the majority of the show, it seems as thought Bonnie is unfeeling and emotionless, but there are moments when her emotions just override and are visually expressed. In episode 7 when she confronts James and Alyssa, Alyssa asks Bonnie, “what happens next?” and it literally clicked in my head that Bonnie never really had a sense of purpose in the world until she met the professor. From there, her purpose was to be his “little salmon” but that ended up not happening and from there, her purpose is to get revenge for him by hunting down and killing James and Alyssa. From there, what does Bonnie do? There’s nothing left. The entire diner scene is just fantastic yet so heartbreaking. At the end of the episode, you just get Bonnie saying, “I’m really tired” and it hits so hard because of all that Bonnie went through.

Air:

Appa: Favorite fictional animal/pet // none

I actually have not read a lot of books with a fictional animal/pet that is super prominent in the story or that I have a big attachment to, so again, none.

Aang: Purest cinnamon roll // Aled Last from Radio Silence by Alice Oseman

Aled Last deserves the whole world and that’s a fact. He has such a pure soul and good intentions, and the fact that he goes through so much hurt in the book, hurts a lot. Aled is just a character you want to hug and protect. It’s so difficult to explain why Aled is a pure cinnamon roll because he just is and you just have to read the book to understand that this boy deserves nothing but love.

Avatar State: A stubborn character/a character that struggles with letting go // Elias Veturius from An Ember in the Ashes series by Sabaa Tahir

I love Elias Veturius with my whole heart and mind and soul, and you should too because he’s just a freaking amazing character. The journey he goes through in this series is so fucking painful because he constantly has to do things and become things that he doesn’t want to but he has to for the sake of keeping the ones he loves safe AND IT’S NOT FAIR THAT HE HAS TO GO THROUGH SO MUCH PAIN. We are always seeing Elias at war with himself and duty, and from this, he does make decisions that causes consequences but ultimately, he chooses duty, leaving the ones he loves behind in order to protect them.

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readersguidetotheuniverse · 4 years

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The Midnight Library, by Matt Haig

The Book of Regrets

Ariadna: I love how the author puts them down on paper —or on video, considering Hugo’s version of the library. Regretting past decisions is part of our human nature, and most of us live in societies that, even though improving, do not give much space for vulnerability and emotional talking. I found it very interesting how writing them down and reflecting —or acting, as Nora does— on them may help us improve, be more gentle and understanding with ourselves and, in turn, with others around us. I think it is a great symbol of how our regrets weigh us down and how we can deal with them in order to raise above them and grow.

Alicia: If I had in front of me a book of everything I regret and I had the chance to change things, would I? Yes. Hundred percent yes. Cause I am a very regretful person and I have done bad things, treated people badly and just fucked up in many many ways. So if I could I would change about a million things, no doubt. However, I don't have that book. And I can't change things from the past. I can only make sure I don't make the same mistakes in the future. Having regrets is natural but also a royal pain in the ass, pardon my French. I have had sleepless nights cause I remembered that one time I embarrassed myself in front of a guy I had a crush on when I was twelve. It sucks. And I'm slowly but steadily trying to come to an agreement with myself that everyone has done things they regret and it's okay, and I just have to move on. Hopefully one day I will fully embrace this thought.

Marina: I’d like to think everybody has a Book of Regrets, be it a literal book or an imaginary one. We all have made choices that we may regret later on in life even though we thought they were the right ones at the time. The fact that Nora sees them all in writing is, comprehensively, overwhelming; I too would feel pain if I were shown all my regrets in one sitting! But otherwise, it’s a way to show the character (as time goes on in the narrative) that she can overcome them, they were the choices that made her Nora, not Nora the swimmer, not Nora the singer, just Nora. And that’s what I take away from the book: life is not pretty and we may regret some choices, but in the end it’s what makes us real and how we got to this point in our lives, even if it’s not the best of times, we will endure.

The library/videoclub store/restaurant, etc (or why it changes from person to person)

Ariadna: At first, it seemed weird that there existed other versions of the «library». Don’t get me wrong; it seems very organic to me to start reading a book or a movie and being transferred to that particular life, I understand how that plain of existence shapes itself according to the psyche of the individual to accommodate them, make them feel secure, calm, at home, in a way. It just didn’t make sense that you ate spaghetti bolognese and were transported into a life in which you’ve moved to a small village in Tuscany and worked as a photographer in a vineyard state, for the lack of a better example.

Alicia: I think it was such a smart move to have different people go through the same thing but with a different setting to fit each individual's life. It made so much sense to me. Everyone goes through different experiences and feels attached to different things, so the most logical thing would be to have a specific setting for each person according to what they feel the most connected to. I like the library the most, especially because the idea of each life being a different book for you to read is fascinating. But I couldn't help imagining an infinite Blockbuster full of movies of your other lives and I love the concept as well. Now that I think about it, mine would probably be some kind of online streaming service. An afterlife Netflix of sorts.

Marina: I found this part very beautiful. The fact that it changes from person to person to best fit their personalities. I thought about what this in-between place would look like for me but I honestly couldn’t come up with anything! There’s not a place that I associate with complete and utter happiness. I have been happy in many places and sad in many others, so to choose just one is very difficult for me.

The ending (it cuts abruptly)

Ariadna: Suffering mental illnesses myself, the ending pissed me off. It is predictable, clichéed and plainly boring. Too “feel-good” for me. I think Matt Haig, having suffered depression too himself, could have taken the opportunity to dwell on real ways to deal with this kind of mental illnesses, instead of creating an imaginary place after commiting suicide where you are given a magical second chance (or third, or fourth, or twentieth). This is straightforwardly triggering and naive and does not give much other message than “you just wait, some day you’ll reach rock bottom and suddenly, if you don’t die, you will be awarded a magical 180 degree turn in your life and everything will be better in a split second”. I get it, he wants to highlight how seeing things from different perspectives may help, but that’s not the way to do it, not at all. I think you already got how pissed I am, so I’m leaving it here.

Alicia: The ending was pretty predictable, some parts of it. For me, at least. But still I liked it. Being a person suffering from anxiety and a bit of depression I know it's not that easy and nice and cute. But, at the end, it's a book and it's fiction and I'm not going to try to solve my life with it. What I took from all the lives and the ending is that there are always going to be regrets, no life is perfect, thinking about what could have happened doesn't help anything. Nora realizes what she wants in her life, what she misses, what she did wrong and works to fix that and be nicer to the people around her. I think it's a nice take. Realistic? Probably not. Depression is not gonna just leave. But I think it's quite optimistic and hopeful and that's not always a bad thing.

Marina: To be completely honest I expected how the book would end from pretty much the beginning. So the fact that it ends where and when it does did not surprise me much. I think Matt Haig could have done a better job. Talking about it with Ariadna and Alicia we have come to the same conclusion: how does Nora deal with her depression? Does she all of a sudden get cured? Or does she still have mental health problems from time to time? It would have been a better ending if it addressed some of those issues but overall it was expected that it wouldn’t.

Mrs. Elm

Ariadna: We all tend to idealise people who do us good or help us in hard times, specially as children. If we are to recall them, we remember them wiser, warmer, prettier... Imho, the library version of Mrs. Elm is an idealisation of the real Mrs. Elm. Being the only supporting adult in her childhood, more specifically, when her father died, Nora considered her a reference, an idol, if you want, so her mind has idealised her like some sort of a gurú or wisewoman. I would have loved to see how, meeting her again in real life, Nora could pinpoint the differences between them and acknowledge that even her young days’ idol has flaws and is a human being like any other. In the end, we tend to love people more because they’re flawed that we would if they were perfect.

Alicia: I think we all have met someone at some point that we looked up to. That person doesn't have to be perfect, or the smartest, or the best person out there. Probably we don't even know that person fully well. But for some reason we find comfort in them, we feel safe. The Mrs Elm from the library and the real Mrs Elm are not the same person. Sometimes we create a mental picture of people that doesn't 100% match with reality, but that doesn't mean it's not true for us. Real Mrs Elm said she was a bad wife and not a good mother, she maybe wasn't the person Nora thought she was, but she was still kind to her and took care of her when she needed it the most. Everyone can make mistakes sometimes but some things can't be faked, like true kindness. Maybe it's a bit naive of me, but I think mistakes can be forgiven if the person really is pure of heart. I think these kinda people are rare. At least, I haven't found many. (Truth be told I tend to easily see the bad in people so I am not the greatest example here). I think that in my library I would find a literature professor I had in my freshman year of college. I rarely talked to him outside of class, and if I did it was barely greeting in hallways, but I admired him so much and I felt at peace when I listened to him speak. I think he would be my Mrs Elm.

Marina: The differences for me are obvious: Mrs Elm in real life is a person, just another normal human being with problems and regrets. Her library counterpart, however, is just an entity that guided Nora through her regrets and helped her “overcome” them. So, in a way, we could theorize that the Mrs Elm in the library is really Nora’s own conscience trying to help her through her mental state.

Quantum theory or the multiverse

Ariadna: I love the idea of the multiverses (who doesn’t, after the whole MCU multiverse, timeline altering mumbo jumbo), of how a single minor decision can change your life drastically. I found it somehow inspiring and terrifying at the same time. It is scary to consider the power every little decision has in your life, how it can turn your life upside down but, at the same time, it offers billions of possibilities, it encourages you to try, to get past the infamous Book of Regrets, for you never know if a «bad decision» could have turned otherwise even more awful than what you think is your life now. It’s all about perspective.

Alicia: I am completely enthralled by the concept of the multiverse and also confused as heck. I am not one for science so really specific explanations just sound like gibberish in my mind, but the idea of an infinite number of universes existing simultaneously blows my mind. I keep seeing it in movies and TV shows and I fall for it every single time. At the same time, it stresses me out a little bit. It makes me wonder what I am doing differently in those other universes, am I happier? Am I successful? What if in one universe I worked harder or wasn't as picky and I managed to get a job I truly enjoy? What if I moved to a different city like I have always wanted to? What if I wasn't as afraid of living...

Marina: I geeked out a bit, not gonna lie, when Hugo explained the whole quantum theory of the multiverse. I’d like to think there’s one Marina out there that, for example, knows how to speak perfect Chinese; or runs marathons every year (though that would be very hard!); or dresses like a hipster or a million other things. I do believe that every choice we make turns into a different reality; but, just the same as it creates a new universe, it makes me who I am. It makes me the woman that writes about books for fun, that likes to have dinner with her friends and get a little tipsy on one cocktail or too shy to talk to anyone but will power through a public talk because she is also a bit of a badass (if I do say so myself ;P). And even though I get sad sometimes because I regret some choices I made, in the end, it brought me here and I have to believe it’s where I am meant to be. I sound way more chipper about it than I actually am sometimes… I mean, I do try to look on the bright side as often as I can!

Nora’s “perfect” life and why she didn’t choose it

Ariadna: Maybe you’ll call me spoilsport, but I think nobody gets their real “perfect” life, that it does not truly exist, because then accomplished turns out to be underwhelming. I think that’s what happened to Nora, why she couldn’t stay in that fairytale version of her life: because she was, in some way, bored. She had everything she ever wanted, therefore, she had nothing to really fight for, nothing to make her life motivating and interesting. I think, in the end, life is just the not-so-perfectly balanced mix of good and bad times, successes and failures. If all we did was win, we would end up not valuing the successes and living a bland, boring life. I think one of the main morals of this book is precisely to learn how to value good and bad times equally, to learn to find the good in the seemingly awful and the bad in the seemingly perfect to find the right in between.

Alicia: I knew quite early on that she'd end up going back to her original life, I think it was quite predictable and expected. However, that didn't stop me wishing she decided to stay in her 'perfect life' with Molly and Ash. Mostly cause I was rooting for her and that happy ending she seemed so desperate to find, and this seemed to be it. She could finally be with someone good who loved her, have a loving family, a good relationship with her brother, have a nice career in philosophy... it was just perfect, but it wasn't hers. And being honest, I also wouldn't want to live another life that wasn't mine. Even if it belongs to myself from another universe, it is still not mine to live. I rather have a life in which everything I have, I earned.

Marina: We all would love to have that “perfect” life, or what we think is a perfect life, right? To have a bigger house, a nicer car, a sexier body, or whatever you think “perfect” means. But not many people can say they actually live their perfect life. Nora gets that choice and, as I think many of us would realize, it’s not altogether what she imagined. Yes, she gets the guy; yes, she gets a great daughter that loves her, but is she happier there than she was in her crappy apartment with her crappy job and her cat? In a way, I guess, but ultimately no. She is aware that this is not the life she created for herself, nor the life she will get to live. I feel like this would happen to all of us if we had the opportunity to live our “perfect” lives, we would get everything we wanted but at what cost? What did we sacrifice to get there? Would it be a price worth paying? As the Stones say: “You can't always get what you want / But if you try sometimes, well, you might find / You get what you need”.

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arecomicsevengood · 5 years

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Nick Drnaso’s SABRINA

This was one of the best-reviewed comics of 2018, shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize. I had no interest in reading it. When a friend saw the profile of Nick Drnaso in The New Yorker, and texted to ask me if I liked him, I had to admit I hadn’t read anything he’d done. There’s a ton of comics coming out all the time, and one of my rules for whether or not to read something is if I think it looks good. Drnaso’s work doesn’t meet this standard.

it looks like reheated Chris Ware. That is obvious, but I mostly hear it from people online who don’t like Chris Ware, which is a perspective I can’t trust. Ware’s work has beauty in it! That’s part of his work’s effect, is the contrast between the beauty of the natural world and the depressive inner lives of the characters that inhabit it. Drnaso’s stuff is ugly, and it’s basically depicting characters whose inner lives we don’t have access to, often because they are so repressed or in pain they don’t have access to it either. This is a valid artistic choice, and I get it, but it’s not that hard to see coming, and it’s off-putting. I’ve read Sabrina now, and it’s utterly joyless. The color palette gives a “pizza under a heatlamp” look at reality, exchanging the vivid for the coagulated.

I didn’t buy it, but a friend gave me a copy recently. It makes sense to me that you’d give it to someone else after reading it. (Tim: Do you want this back?) It’s hard to imagine wanting to open the book up and flip through it after reading just to look at he drawings, which is a big part of the reason I buy comics. Drnaso’s art is the sort of thing that makes people who don’t know anything about comics look and go “So they make this on the computer?” It is very easy to look at it and not think about drawing in any kind of normal human way. There’s an absence of life to it that feels inorganic, factory-made. It feels like a Tupperware container.

I knew that going in. I also knew that the experience of the comic, the quality, could still theoretically transcend that and offer a good reading experience. The book’s blurbed by the novelist Zadie Smith. It’s a “literary comic,” not an “art comic,” to cite a relatively recent distinction I don’t really believe in. I love literature. I am a pretty big reader of “actual” books, and have written reviews of fiction and poetry before and would like to do so again. However, the idea that reading “comics as literature” means not caring about the drawings seems to derive from some mistaken idea, gleaned from a comic shop clerk, about what “good” comic book art is. Or perhaps the crowd is more highbrow, and so have an idea of “good” art that derives from a gallery context where the human figure rarely appears. Either way, it ignores the role good comic book art defines the reading experience. For any book people that might be reading this, let me try to explain it in brief: I don’t know if they use it on newer printings, but all of the Nabokov books I own have this blurb on them from John Updike, where he says “Nabokov writes prose the only way it should be written: Ecstatically.” I’m sure a ton of book people have read this, and even internalized it, but have yet to apply this standard to graphic novels. Comics should be drawn the same way prose is written: Ecstatically. Most comics, it should be noted, reach this standard. It’s notable that both Updike and Nabokov were fans of comics, long before the graphic novel era.

The same way I flip through a comic to look at the art after reading it, you might do the same thing with a book of fiction or poetry, if it had good good scenes, dialogue, interesting sentences. All of these things compel you through a book the first time, beyond just “reading it for the plot.” What’s funny is that reading a book for the plot is largely disdained by the literary crowd- all the aspects I highlight are generally considered what marks a book as being “worth reading” by those with even a normal amount of snobbery. A plot is secondary to the amount of feeling a work of literature can inspire.

Sabrina is not particularly plot-intensive. I don’t think it’s particularly sharp in its characterization either: While prose could depict a subjective internal landscape, and a more active art style in a comic would to, Drnaso resists this. The world of the book feels mediated, through these isolated and atomized means. The vibe is that of CCTV cameras or twitter icons. The thing I think of as being Sabrina’s virtue is its timeliness. Weirdly, this is something I think book people disparage a lot! I think there’s even bits of general advice given by writing professors where the use of brand names is disdained because of the way it dates a text, although this might be changing.

So the praise for Sabrina seems highly conditional to me. It’s based on an understanding that drawing takes a long time, so the appreciation for its timeliness is really an appreciation of prescience, which normally you have to wait a few years to praise a book for. Of course, in 2018, timeliness and prescience do feel particularly jumbled. It seems like everyone’s memory is shot, and no one has any idea of when anything happened. Everything happening, however, has been foreshadowed and is somewhat unsurprising, given the precedent, but it still feels shocking because things are happening at a rate of speed they can’t really be processed.

Let me summarize this book. The title character, Sabrina, disappears. Her boyfriend falls into a deep depression, assuming she’s dead, and goes to live with a friend, who is in the military. They don’t talk a lot. They’re both depressed and isolated individuals. The boyfriend starts listening to an Alex Jones style radio show. Eventually it comes out that Sabrina is not just dead, but her murder was filmed, with the killer sending the video out to news stations, before killing himself. There’s then talk on the radio show about this story being a false flag, causing everyone who knew Sabrina in real life to be harassed by the radio audience.

The feeling in this book is pretty limited. It’s a pretty small emotional range. I can appreciate a wallow in bad feeling, or something so emotionally intense you don’t really go back to it often for how demanding it is. (I haven’t reread Building Stories, for instance.) A lot of the joy in comics comes from the drawing, from witnessing perception, seeing how another person sees manifests through their hand. This book feels less about interiority, and more about the media, and experiencing life through this depressing mediated scrim. It’s presented almost as a choice— choosing to embrace computer screens, talk radio, etc., rather than having personal relationships because genuine feeling is too intense. But the sadness of the book comes down to this presentational style where the natural and organic never enters into it.

Because of this narrow range of feeling, I don’t feel like any of the characters are well-developed or interesting. The thing that makes them feel “real” is how inaccessible they are, absent any passions. The opening sequence depicts Sabrina, but it doesn’t really seem like there’s joy or warmth in her life, or love in her relationships. The spiritually drab quality of distance in this sequence marks the rest of the book, which she’s dead for. In terms of presentation, there’s little difference between sequences involving Sabrina’s sister (who is arguably handling things better and more gracefully) and her boyfriend. The narrative distance from each character is equally voyeuristic. It isolates them, and creates an effect also present in Jimmy Corrigan, where it seems like they’re incapable of relating to one another, and so only hurt each other.

Within the context of the book, there is an article that explains the weird paranoid narrative of Sabrina’s death being a faked tragedy as bizarre right-wing weirdness. This article is spread over sixteen panels, each containing a sentence or two, one of the ways the comic’s layouts remind you of reading on your phone on a mobile app. That article is written by a Molly O’Connell. This character, the one who’s able to see through the falsehood of things and perceive things accurately, takes their name from Molly Colleen O’Connell, a visual artist and cartoonist whose work is very much the opposite of Drnaso’s: It’s wild and free and funny and joyful, more likely to be appreciated as “fine art” or get gallery shows than to be viewed as “literature” by major press outlets. Presumably the two of them know each other through the Chicago comics scene. It is really funny and interesting to me that the character who sees through the falsehoods of the media narrative in Sabrina is named after someone whose work basically explodes all the contrivances Drnaso builds his style around. The person who sees through the notion of a mediated narrative as a tool to isolate people and prey on fear is named after someone whose work feels very natural and human, but is genuinely eccentric, and so has yet to find a mass audience.

This is what the real Molly O’Connell’s work looks like, your reward for scrolling past those Drnaso sequences:

Even if Drnaso isn’t intending to argue that O’Connell is a better artist than he is, I think he understands that his approach has certain limits. That whole New Yorker profile is built about self-deprecation, a Comics Journal interview with him had him saying that he almost threw the book away rather than print it. He knows his work is depressing, but he’s only capable of making the work that he makes. I get that. I respect that, even. It’s just funny that the book, with its critique of the media as this thing that isolates us from one another, ends up creating this additional critique of the media as they respond positively to the book, where they choose this joyless half-dead thing as a high point of a medium which is capable of work that genuinely gives life back to readers.

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everly-kindred · 5 years

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Eve’s Diary - Entry #44

Synopsis: A very snowy week of January passes, and Eve collects her thoughts on the happenings.

Words: 1,501

Date: 17th of January, 2027

Dear Diary,

Well. It has been quite a week. I feel like my mind is too full of things, and I’m definitely looking forward to the weekend to process some of it. I’m gonna at least write down what I remember, to sort of… unload and unpack.

First of all, I finally approached that Persephone Vitrac girl. I didn’t mean to, but I stumbled upon her and kind of just… started asking all those questions about werewolves that have been bouncing around my brain. I had been reading those old Owl Post articles, after all, so I was really curious.

What I learned was:

Dittany and silver are used to heal werewolf injuries - silver does not hurt werewolves. And this is the only thing that can heal those wounds, thus why almost all, if not ALL werewolves are also magical folk.

Werewolves face so much discrimination because of their violent nature, that it drove them to the Dark Lord’s army, as they believed they would finally be safe and in a community of their own.

The discrimination stems from the fact werewolves do not retain their human mind when changed and have a weird and strong desire to attack other humans…

UNLESS they take wolfsbane, which was only invented around 50 years ago, and magical folk live really, really long so many remember life before wolfsbane.

Werewolf related injuries are considered curse damage and will never heal properly.

No one really knows where the curse of lycanthropy started.

The Lovelace woman I read about in the papers is the one who turned Persephone, several years ago, and was the one doing the Hogsmeade attacks that I read about, dreamed about, even had a vision about.

I think that’s everything she told me. Anyways, it gave me a lot to think about. Especially because we had our full moon just last week - and ironically enough, January’s full moon is called the ‘Wolf Moon.’ Or at least, that’s one of a few nicknames for it. It’s also called the Old, Winter, or After-Yule moon.

For this moon, I asked my tarot deck to present me with a card that would show me what to expect between this moon and the next. I know that I should do a larger reading for esbats, but I honestly don’t have the energy to.

Anyways, I pulled judgment, which tells me imminent change is coming, and I will have to make a very important decision of some kind. I’m unsure of what this could be, so for now, I will sit tight, continue my studies and practices, and wait to see how life unfolds.

Most of my dreams have been nonsense, like, the other night I dreamt that Talula owned a shop inside the school, and she made and sold really pretty velvet dresses, and then this boy who was really mean came and lit the shop and the school on fire. But, like, Talula thought it was funny? And it just didn’t feel like how any of my serious dreams felt, so I sort of brushed it off.

Though I did have a dream about Aures, too. She was really sad and was sitting in the snow alone, when three roses grew from seedlings to buds, to fully blossoming in a circle around her. And then these roses began to glow and turned into three foxes curled around her, and the foxes seemed to make her happy. So I took some of the wood from artificer club, and a knife and paint, and carved Aures her own little wooden fox that I put in a terrarium for her.

Speaking of, Bonnie has been showing us how to carve our own wands in Artificer club. I tried to make mine look like a berry branch… Maybe Holly or Blackberry, I’m not sure. We’re going to paint and polish our wands next week. I want mine to be colourful rather than just polished wood. I feel like there are so many creative opportunities with wands that don’t get explored!

Also in Artificer club, I talked to Bobby and this older boy who had approached us to talk to Tal, about making a jellyfish lantern. If I get a floaty fabric and a jar, I could probably make it.. I’d have to learn how to cast bluebell flames and a few floating spells like wingardium leviosa, and I feel like there’d have to be some level of enchantment involved, but maybe Bonnie could help me! I think it sounds so nice to have a glowy jellyfish floating above you as a nightlight.

We had Defense Against the Dark Arts, and Vikander had something really noisy in some sort of cage covered in cloth that looked stained with either blood or jam. I hope whatever it was is closer to the latter, and not the former. Anyways, Vikander asked us about dark creatures, what makes a creature dark, and that sort of thing. And Aures said something that sort of echoed and reminded me of a thought I’d had when we were talking about dragons. And I’ve come to the conclusion that humans, both magic and muggle, really are the most deadly creatures on the planet.

History is really… bloodstained, and we’ve caused so much damage to all living creatures, ourselves, and our own planet. So we must be the darkest creatures of all, even if we have the capability of being the opposite. We can choose to be different, we can choose to be light. So that’s what I’m going to do. I will be one of the lights in the darkness. I have to be. If no one did it, we’d all drown and cease to exist.

Speaking of dark things like this, I need to remember to write Aisling a letter and ask how she’s doing. The attacks have continued to be addressed, and they’re apparently still looking for the guy who has been going after animagi. I hope they catch him.

On lighter notes, some fun things have happened this week, too! Like, Professor Banks was substituting for Transfigurations this week, and we were talking about the basic functions of Transfigurations and whatnot… And I think… Well, I asked her if it’d be possible to use magic to turn oneself into a faerie, and she wouldn’t answer, which tells me it is! If I can just make myself really small, and give myself wings and maybe pointy ears… It’d be wonderful! And dangerous too, of course, but you know…

I went to Arithmancy and learned that even though numbers and my brain don’t really get along, it’s an interesting class! Professor Rask made all these pretty shapes in the air with the wand-writing spell, and we were meant to copy those shapes and sort of do something to comprehend them, but I couldn’t get my wand to work with me. I also met a few new people - a boy named Colin Mackenzie (who called me Lady Kindred, thank you very much! Makes me sound like a knight or a princess or something!) and a girl named Maddy Hemlock, who tried to help me cast the spells.

There was this girl in that class who was really mean to one of the older Hufflepuffs. She called her a loser and told her to get out of ‘her seat’ and it was just… really odd, but no fights were started or anything. She was just kinda loud about it, but the Hufflepuff moved and didn’t kick up a fuss. I didn’t like it though.

In Herbology, Ruby’s friend Octavia sat next to me. It was her birthday, so I gave her a chocolate chip biscuit with some icing. I guess she really liked it, because she got really energetic afterward! I also gave one to this other girl who was sitting next to me, another Slytherin, because her stomach rumbled and it was close to dinnertime anyhow.

And then tonight, I had divinations with Bonnie. We were continuing our eye study, and so Bonnie told me to look in her eyes and tell her what I saw. Basically, to no one’s surprise, Bonnie is a brilliant mind and will have many opportunities before her. But I warned her not to burn herself out by putting too much on her plate.

I think I want to paint her eyes, as well. So maybe I’ll do that this weekend… paint some eyeballs and write Aisling a letter.

It’s been snowing like crazy. I feel trapped in this castle, in a way, and comforted in another. Like the snow is a clean, sparkling blanket against the stone walls, keeping us safe to be cosy by our warm fires. I’m certainly much sleepier this time of year. I love all of the seasons, honestly, and I especially love when things shift and change, so I’m really getting ready for spring. I know that’s a long way away, though.

Anyways, it’s super late and I need to go to sleep.

Much love, Everly

About the Character: Everlina Rosemary Kindred is an imaginative Hufflepuff attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. She keeps up with her magical journey through a series of diary entries, dream journals, and tarot readings, all documented for future reflection. Her diary is a small glimpse into her enchanted life, and her adventure into the wizarding world and all its splendors. If you’d like more information about Eve, visit her wiki page.

About the Author: My name is Katherine! I am a 21-year-old Hufflepuff & Pukwudgie from Louisville, Kentucky. This page is my creative journey into the magical world, through the lenses of Second Life. Here I post diary entries, dream journals, and tarot readings all from my character’s perspective. If you’d like more information about me, visit my Flickr!

Outfit Credits:

Hair - Magika - Hair - Faye

Eyes - Gloom. - Walkers Collection - Undying ((Now at Epiphany!))

Skin - DeeTaleZ *Appliers* for Genus Heads *Sienna* Nordic

Head - GENUS Project - Genus Head - Baby Face

Headband - Mossu - Fleur.Wreath

Sweater - neve top - sharp

Book & Pose - *!R.O!* Knowledge BENTO Pose

Choker - Whisper ~ Teeny Choker

Ring - ^^Swallow^^ Lock of Love Ring

#harry potter #diary #witch #hufflepuff #magic #magical #witchy #hogwarts #journal #secondlife #mischief managed

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newyearseves2020 · 5 years

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New Research on Happiness of New Years

As we start the New Year, I thought it fitting to investigate the very greeting that such a large number of us share with each other this season. My informal supposition that will be that the majority of us need very a lot to be happy. For me, it resembles a dashboard marker that the horde pieces that make up my life are commonly functioning admirably and are in concordance with one another. However, how would you discover it? I've long heard that happiness is an adventure, not a goal. Others have opined that happiness is a decision we make (or not) every day. The two thoughts are valid for course, yet they're not the entire story.

New Research on Happiness

There have been a few examinations distributed as of late which have investigated the idea of happiness on a considerably more intensive and logical premise than any time in recent memory. In her new book, The How of Happiness, University of California Professor Sonja Lyubomirsky reasoned that as much as half of an individual's ability to be [consistently] happy is either hereditary or set through social molding by age 16. Another 10% is dictated by their present life conditions (monetary, connections, work, and so on.). What's more, that leaves about40% that is dictated by something else. As indicated by Lyubomirsky, that "something else" is our frame of mind, demeanor, our aim and our desires.

Suggestions

The so-what of this exploration is that, truly, some people do in truth have a simpler time being and remaining happy. While to some, this might be somewhat discouraging, it's in reality OK with me. There will consistently be people more intelligent than me on specific points, more gifted at specific errands, and "wired" more adequately in specific territories (simply ask my significant other). Fortunately despite everything I am responsible for in any event 40% of what results in my degree of happiness on an everyday premise. Truth be told, in light of the fact that my conviction is that my life conditions are likewise generally formed by the choices I make and moves I make, I'm really fit for controlling about half of my happiness variables...and that is simply in the short run.

Happiness and Relationships

There is another significant, new finding on happiness that is likewise important. In his book, Stumbling on Happiness, Professor Daniel Gilbert noticed that practically all happiness is experienced inside the setting of our associations with other people. While certain careful occasions (like winning a prize, or achieving an objective) may bring some degree of individual joy, the most manageable happiness occasions are either experienced or drilled inside the setting of others in our lives. Supporting this thought, Lyubomirsky's exploration members who didn't have sound, fulfilling connections for the most part evaluated themselves as less happy on her abstract Happiness Quiz.

It's likewise fascinating to know a little about the connection among happiness and cash. While we've all heard that cash can't purchase happiness (or love), there are some circumstances where it really can. In any case, there are a couple of conditions that should be considered. As indicated by Gilbert, cash will possibly add to an individual's happiness if 1) you spend it right, 2) you've originated from moderately low intends to begin with, 3) you have more of it than a large portion of the others inside your hover of family, companions and partners.

What We Can Do

My decision is that there are a couple of very straightforward things that every one of us can do on an ordinary (daily?)basis that will stack the happiness deck to support us.

* Practice the specialty of appreciation. Consistently concentrating the mind on those things in life that we are now happy for, conditions it to find that state more and more effectively. One ongoing examination by Professor Richard Davidson from the University of Wisconsin-Madison found that people who go through 30 minutes every day concentrating on graciousness, empathy and appreciation really started to change the synaptic hard-wiring in their cerebrums inside as meager as about fourteen days.

* Get your self-talk under control. Let's be honest, it's for all intents and purposes difficult to encounter happiness when your self-talk is to continue reminding yourself how hopeless, appalling and awful off you are. Start addressing yourself the manner in which you'd like to be...even when you're not exactly there yet.

* Focus on supporting quality connections. Regardless of whether at home, at work, or inside the network everywhere, become a people developer. There is nothing very as amazing as the power of thoughtfulness, appreciation, and fellowship coordinated towards others that boomerangs likewise.

* Seek out other happy people. You know those people who will in general cut you down, regardless of how up you are? Point of confinement your presentation to them. Furthermore, if there are some with whom (due to condition) you should communicate, make sure to off-set them with bounty who consider the to be as half full and develop you. Some of the most significant decisions we make in life will be the ones about the people with whom we choose to encircle ourselves.

Pushing ahead

My associate and great companion Sue Thomas as of late imparted a statement to her perusers from creator and University of California teacher John Schaar. While not explicitly about happiness, it speaks significantly about the quest for and venture towards it. "What's to come isn't some place we are going, however one we are making. The ways are not to be found, however made. Also, the action of making them changes both the maker and their goal."

Paul Meshanko is a persuasive orator, creator and entrepreneur who comprehends that it's not what you think but rather how you imagine that decides your accomplishment in life.

While numerous speakers engage, Paul enables spectators to comprehend that being more gainful and more satisfied, in any part of life, requires more than a vibe decent redirection. It includes an adjustment in perspectives and frames of mind.

In 1997, following an effective 12-year vocation with Honeywell Automotive, Paul opened the Edge Learning Institute's Cleveland deals office. From that point forward, he has given inspirational keynote introductions and initiative, staff and gathering improvement projects to organizations across the country. Paul was additionally a contributing originator to the organization's Increasing Respect in the Workplace® assorted variety program.

Paul has roused more than 500,000 people in 20 nations. He is reliably evaluated a "top tier" speaker and facilitator by organizations across the nation. His talking subjects center around customer needs and incorporate hierarchical culture, work environment decent variety, individual viability, change the executives, teambuilding, time the board and work-life balance.

#happy new year #happy new year 2020 #new year greetings #new year #wishes #wishes new year #new year wishes

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inkpotlanterned · 6 years

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character creation tag

Thank you @the-real-rg for tagging me in this!

I’m going into depth on, surprisingly, not my deuteragonist in Canary Song but someone you could even consider a side character. Ritchy!

Note: Since my last character creation tag, this WIP has changed A LOT.

1. what was the first element of your character that you remember considering?

Ritchy is every friend I’ve ever loved rolled into one person. He was meant to be symbolic of home and, as a coming of age novel, Canary Song was going to focus on Elliot stepping away from her comfort zone. That’s not to say she leaves Ritchy though. I think what I wanted most was for Ritchy to be someone Elliot could rely on and, by the end of the book, for Elliot to be someone Ritchy could rely on. Because of the nature of their relationship, I made him the Mom friend and pulled in a lot of the traits I admire in my own best friends.

2) Did you design them with any other characters/OCs from their universe in mind?

As mentioned above, Ritchy was always meant to be Elliot’s best friend. Originally, in You, Me, and Her, Ritchy’s equivalent would’ve been “Her,” the friend that the speaker was constantly contacting and falling back on for guidance and inspiration while the person they were in love with fell apart.

3) How did you choose their name?

I used to spend hours finding the perfect name. My main character, Elliot Minh Trang certainly had a lot of thought put into her.

Ritchy was not like that. I wanted a gender neutral name because, originally, he was going to use they/them pronouns. I kind of just came up with it on the spot (almost like a stand-in name) and it stuck around. Most of my characters are named this way since I tend to avoid assigning genders or races until much later in the writing process unless it’s directly relevant to the kind of character I’m creating.

4) In developing their backstory, what elements of the world they live in played the most influential parts?

Elliot sees a magical world. Everything she sees and is surrounded by is fantastical and vivid and surreal. Ritchy was meant to be the opposite of that. Originally, Ritchy wasn’t even going to have a flashy vision associated with him like all the other side characters do. In a world where everything Elliot sees is extraordinary, her favorite sight will always be her best friend.

5) Is there any significance behind their hair colour?

It’s never mentioned. I guess it’s probably brown?

6) Is there any significance behind their eye colour?

Ritchy was originally Chinese in my mind (because all my characters start off as some type of Asian) so his eye color was predictably brown. Now that I’ve decided he is Mexican, his eye color remains brown.

7) Is there any significance behind their height?

He’s tall because I am short and, as a result, all of my closest friends appear very tall to me.

8) What (if anything) do you relate to within their character/story?

I can really relate to the fierce protectiveness and care Ritchy feels towards his younger siblings and his best friend, Elliot. While each relationship is different, throughout all of them, Ritchy remains supportive of them exploring their own identities and willing to do nearly anything to help them become comfortable in the world.

9) Are they based off of you, in some way?

His gender is definitely very personal to me. Ritchy is nonbinary. He may not use they/them pronouns, but he is nonbinary. It isn’t important to the story or to his character, it simply is. I am in a similar position. I’ve acknowledged my gender for what it is, but feel comfortable with accepting pronouns as separate from my gender. It doesn’t matter if strangers perceive me as purely female, I know who I am.

The one difference between Ritchy and I in this respect is that Ritchy has changed his name and come out to his parents. Ritchy is a lot more honest and open than me. He was also aware of his sister’s struggle to come out as trans which led him to step forward first about a year or two before her so that he could explain gender to his parents and normalize the concept to his family.

10) Did you know what the OC’s sexuality would be at the time of their creation?

I don’t know Ritchy’s sexuality. He has no real romantic relationships in the novel. Considering the company I keep, he’s probably bisexual. However, it wouldn’t be unfair to think of him as on the aromantic spectrum (or even aromantic.)

11) What have you found to be most difficult about creating art for your OC (any form of art: Writing, drawing, edits, etc.)?

Drawing Ritchy is such a pain. Also, there are three chapters written from Ritchy’s perspective that I cannot for the life of me complete because Ritchy is friendlier than me and sees the world as a brighter place. It’s also difficult for me to authentically speak as him because I write with too much prose.

12) How far past the canon events that take place in their world have you extended their story, if at all?

I haven’t. My characters exist and then they don’t. Think Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead. They didn’t exist and then they were created and, in their creation, also gained 25 years of life from nowhere. I like to leave the future open-ended for my own and for reader interpretation.

I think Ritchy would be happy as a high school band teacher/music professor though.

13) If you had to narrow it down to 2 things that you MUST keep in mind while working with your OC, what would those things be?

1) Ritchy does not speak with floral prose; he gets to the point. 2) Ritchy is used to steering the conversation towards other people and rarely talks about himself.

14) What is something about your OC that can make you laugh?

He has the goofiest glasses. Also, he’s perfectly capable of pulling the “dumb older brother” persona when he’s in public with his siblings just to embarrass them.

15) What is something about your OC can make you cry?

16) Is there some element you regret adding to your OC or their story?

He’s very different from me. Religious, open-hearted, naturally compassionate, more extroverted. His culture is completely different from my own. His mom is Mexican, his dad and siblings are Arab. I basically have to mine information from my friends constantly.

17) What is the most recent thing you’ve discovered about your OC?

I most recently planned out Ritchy’s relationship with all of his family members. He calls his biological dad by his name and calls his stepdad, “Dad.”

18) What is your favourite fact about your OC?

He’s a good person. Most characters are complicated because there are two sides to them; Ritchy is elegant because all sides of him are good.

Tagging @stardust-and-smoke, @sulfurousmirrorscapes, @girlnovels, and @stone-goddess-writing

#character tag #wip #canary song

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sojourner-between-worlds · 6 years

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The Problem of Susan, pt.2

In case you missed it, the first part is here. You don’t have to read that first, but if you’re curious on reasons why all views are valid on this subject or why the witnesses are, indeed, reliable, then head on over to that link.

This post, however, is my own personal view on Susan’s fate, in regard to the series itself. There will be a third post with a Biblical perspective, as well. (It was supposed to all be in one, but I think this is far long enough for one sitting.)

I’m not trying to convince anyone to change what they think (I’ve already stated more than once that every view is a valid one), but I do hope I can get you to think about your own view -- question it, refine it, make it better. (Differing opinions don’t have to be bad, yes?) Feel free to comment/message me/reblog/whatever; I’m down for discourse on this. (Dangerous words, I know. I might even change my mind!) So let’s get started, shall we?

(All quotes taken from the 2008 HarperCollins Edition, which is a 7-in-1 volume so page numbers will not reflect single books.)

Susan Pevensie is never reunited with her siblings and Aslan.

I debated starting with the typical passage everyone practically has memorized from reading it so many times in posts like these (you know the one, from the Last Battle, that literally everyone sites no matter their stance), and decided against it. If you want to see what I have to say about that passage specifically, you can head on back up to that link and read part one. The bits relevant to this post can be summed up as follows: None of her siblings deny what is said. It would be one thing if they were just talking among themselves, but Tirian is there. Tirian who knows nothing of the Gentle Queen except of her life in Narnia. Why would they want him to start thinking badly of her? They wouldn’t. But they also don’t want to deny the truth or sugar-coat it either. So good ol’ Peter changes the subject, and that’s all. He can’t deny that she indeed did say that Narnia was just fantasy, but he doesn’t wish to see her time in Narnia tainted either.

What I take from that popular passage? Susan disowned Narnia.

So let me take this a little further, and very simply refute a lot of popular opinions in one go: Aslan did not abandon her; she abandoned Narnia. If you think Aslan abandoned her, you need to go reread the entire series because thinking that He abandoned her goes against the very character established over the course of the books. The reason she was not allowed to return with them was not because she ‘grew up.’ She grew up in Narnia, too. She had suitors. (...Or did you just miss that entire subplot in the Horse and His Boy?) As a queen, she would have had many beautiful gowns. She didn’t like to go to war, but nowhere was she ever made out to be less of a queen because of that (and, let’s face it: ruling a country is a lot more than just marching off to war; she may have opted out of battle, but she definitely wasn’t just sitting on her butt doing nothing while her siblings were away). In fact, nowhere was she made out to be less of a queen for any of the above mentioned things. In fact, Tirian immediately recognizes that she’s missing. If those things had made her less of a queen, why would he know her just as he knew the others? She was seen as a powerful queen for her femininity just as much as Lucy was seen as powerful for being a warrior, because those things were not, of themselves, bad things.

So what really happened then?

It was a choice. Plain and simple.

Just like her siblings, she made a choice when she returned to England. They choose to remember and talk about it often. She choose to forget.

I might add here, though, that it may not have necessarily been a conscious choice -- to forget, at least. If you’ll all remember how, at the end of the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe, they had all forgotten England as if it had been “a dream, or a dream of a dream.” They forgot England because it wasn’t a prominent part of their lives and it wasn’t relevant to ruling in Narnia. Susan could have just as easily forgotten Narnia the same way.

However, it was still a choice. It was still a choice for her to stop talking about Narnia with her siblings. And when she stopped talking about it, she genuinely forgot that it was real. But what drove her to the choice of forgetting? Choosing to become so engrossed in England and choosing to regard everything that happened in Narnia as unimportant.

“But she was just doing what Aslan told her to do! To move on!�� Yes, that is true. But not entirely. We don’t know what exactly Aslan said to Peter and Susan before they left for the last time, but if we’re assuming they were told the same as Edmund and Lucy, then we have to assume they were told everything the same, which means that not only were Peter and Susan told to live in their own world but they were supposed to try to find Aslan as he was known there. Completely forgetting and becoming engrossed in the world doesn’t fit the second half, now does it?

It was a choice. Plain and simple. And Susan chose wrong.

So now that I’ve established that the fault is hers and hers alone, why do I think she never made it back eventually?

Let’s start by talking about materialism.

Because it’s about her faith, not materialism.

A lot of people argue about what role materialism plays and just how far it goes towards her eternal destination, so let me offer this: Materialism was not the issue, but it did play a part. Susan’s materialism (lipstick and nylons and invitations) was the visible quantity by which they measured her spiritual decline. We can’t see anyone else’s heart, but people’s hearts are reflected in what they value. Susan placed value on material things, and that’s what other people saw and recognized, and that’s why Jill made a point of it in the Last Battle. She couldn’t see Susan’s heart, but she could see the things Susan appeared to value.

But material things were never the problem in and of themselves -- as I already stated.

It was her faith -- or, rather, her lack thereof.

Again, I’d like to draw your attention back to the idea of forgetting. When they were in Narnia the first time, they all forgot England. It wasn’t relevant to their current lives, so they didn’t talk much about it or think much about it. When Susan returned from their second trip, the same was true for her. Living in England and knowing she would never return, Narnia was no longer relevant to her. Unlike her siblings, she didn’t seek to hold onto that knowledge and so didn’t talk about it anymore or even really think about it.

I’ve always been told you make time for the things that are important to you. When you love something, you want to talk about it, right? (I mean, c’mon, be honest with yourself: you wouldn’t be on tumblr if that wasn’t true. We all have things we love to talk about to the point that we’re willing to talk to perfect strangers about it, even.) The things that you love and that are important and that you value are the things you want to talk about. And, as Eustace tells us in the Last Battle, Susan no longer wanted to talk about Narnia.

When Narnia was no longer before her, what did she use to fill the void? Lipstick and nylons and invitations. Instead of finding faith, she chose to find the world.

(As an aside, I do fully believe she could have brushed it off as irrelevant at the first partially out of anger or bitterness or flat-out hurt at never being able to return. As time passed, perhaps she held a grudge, but perhaps she also came to realize that it was truly irrelevant and there was nothing else behind her forgetting. Regardless of either situation, it was still a choice, she still forgot, and it still happened over time, not right away.)

The progression of her fall can be summed up as follows:

Susan left Narnia and found it to be no longer relevant to her life.

Susan stopped talking about Narnia because it was no longer relevant to her and, as a result, became infatuated with worldly things.

Susan forgot Narnia and denounced it as a silly game.

But why would someone give up so easily on something they once loved?

Maybe because she didn’t really believe in the first place.

Let’s start with the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe:

Even more than Peter, Susan didn’t want to believe Narnia was there in the first place.

After talking to Professor Kirke, Peter almost seems willing to believe it could be true (not that it necessarily is, only that it could be).

“But do you really mean, sir,” said Peter, “that there could be other worlds -- all over the place, just round the corner -- like that?” --- “Nothing is more probable,” said the Professor. (Pg. 132)

And Peter leaves it at that.

“But what are we to do?” said Susan. She felt that the conversation was beginning to get off the point. (Pg. 136)

She couldn’t leave it alone, and felt that Lucy believing was solely the problem, not at all concerned with whether or not her sister had, in fact, been telling the truth. She refused to accept that it could be the truth and only wanted to know how to make her sister stop believing. She wouldn’t even consider it.

Susan starts out by making excuses.

“I -- I wonder if there’s any point in going on,” said Susan. “I mean, it doesn’t seem particularly safe here and it looks as if it won’t be much fun either. And it’s getting colder every minute, and we’ve brought nothing to eat. What about just going home?” (Pg. 136-137).

She only changes her mind for Lucy’s sake. She understands Lucy feeling guilty about Mr Tumnus, so, even though she’d rather go home, she gives in.

She tries to get them to turn around.

“Let’s go home,” said Susan. And then, though nobody said it out loud, everyone suddenly realized the same fact that Edmund had whispered to Peter at the end of the last chapter. They were lost. (Pg. 139)

The only reason she consents to follow Mr Beaver is because she realizes they are lost anyway so there’s no point in arguing over it.

Unlike the others, she regrets being there.

"How perfectly dreadful!” said Susan as they at last came back in despair. “Oh, how I wish we’d never come.” (Pg. 148)

Yes, those words could have just been spoken in regret over losing track of her brother, but she’s the only one to utter these words; Peter, instead, immediately asks what can be done. He and Lucy immediate look to what can be done instead of bemoaning their situation.

No one else tries to make any excuse to leave (except for Edmund, but we all know what he was like at that point in the story, and even he doesn’t fight as hard against it as she does).

In summary: She was the only one who, even after seeing it for herself, didn’t want to stay.

And then in Prince Caspian:

Even after having ruled for fifteen years previously, Susan doubted.

“Where do you think you saw him?” asked Susan. --- “Don’t talk like a grown-up,” said Lucy, stamping her foot. “I didn’t think I saw him. I saw him.” (Pg. 373)

“Don’t be angry, Lu,” said Susan, “but I do think we should go down. I’m dead tired. Do let’s get out of this wretched wood into the open as quick as we can. And none of us except you saw anything.” (Pg. 374)

“Down,” said Peter after a long pause. “I know Lucy may be right after all, but I can’t help it. We must do one or the other.” (Pg. 374)

Peter at least acknowledges that Lucy could be right. Susan flat out refuses to believe Lucy saw anything because no one except her saw. As Edmund pointed out, this same type of situation had happened before, and Lucy had been right. And he says that before Susan casts her vote. Susan decides that doing what she would rather do is more important than trusting her sister and believing in Aslan.

Just like in LWW, she refuses to believe that Lucy is telling the truth and refuses to believe in Aslan.

Then she tried Susan. Susan did really wake up, but only to say in her most annoying grown-up voice, “You’ve been dreaming, Lucy. Go to sleep again.” (Pg. 381)

“Can you [see Aslan], Susan?” --- “No, of course I can’t,” snapped Susan. “Because there isn’t anything to see. She’s been dreaming. So lie down and go to sleep, Lucy.” (Pg. 383)

“Don’t talk nonsense, Lucy,” said Susan. “Of course you can’t go off on your own. Don’t let her, Peter. She’s being downright naughty.” --- “I’ll go with her, if she must go,” said Edmund. “She’s been right before.” --- “I know she has,” said Peter. “And she may have been right this morning [.]” (Pg. 383)

“You’ve no right to try to force the rest of us like that. It’s four to one and you’re the youngest,” said Susan. --- “Oh, come on,” growled Edmund. “We’ve got to go. There’ll be no peace till we do.” He fully intended to back Lucy up [.] (Pg. 384) (Technically three to two, since Edmund had already agreed to go with her. Susan doesn’t know how to count, lol.)

Even in Narnia, Susan’s first instinct is to tell Lucy, “You’ve been dreaming. It isn’t real.” Edmund fully backs her up; Peter doesn’t completely doubt her. Susan plays it off as make-believe because she can’t see Aslan with her own eyes.

Susan is the last of the Pevensies to be able to see Him -- and for good reason.

This time Edmund saw him. “Oh, Aslan!” he cried, darting forward. But the Lion whisked round and began padding up the slope on the far side of the Rush. --- “Peter, Peter,” cried Edmund. “Did you see?” --- “I saw something,” said Peter. (Pg. 385)

[A]nd always the glorious, silently pacing Beast ahead. Everyone except Susan and the Dwarf could see him now. (Pg. 385, emphasis mine.)

“I see him now. I’m sorry.” --- “That’s all right.” --- “But I’ve been far worse than you know. I really believed it was him - he, I mean - yesterday. ... I mean, deep down inside. Or I could have, if I’d let myself. ...” (Pg. 286, emphasis mine.)

Then, after an awful pause, the deep voice said, “Susan”. Susan made no answer but the others thought she was crying. “You have listened to fears child,” said Aslan. (Pg. 386)

Edmund could see Him by the time they crossed the river. Peter could see Him before they got to the top of the other side of the gorge. Susan couldn’t see him until they were well on their way after getting to the top again. Why did it take her so much longer? Because even in Narnia -- when she could see the world before her -- her faith in Aslan was weak. She said it herself: that she could have believed if she’d let herself. But other things -- fear in this case -- got in the way, and those fears were only swept aside after she could physically see Him with her own eyes.

In summary: Susan spends the majority of their time in Narnia the second time doubting Aslan is there, even though fifteen years of experience should have told her otherwise.

“Or, I could have, if I’d let myself.”

Susan didn’t just forget Narnia. She didn’t really believe in the first place. I don’t think she really wanted to believe, either.

From the very beginning, she had been dragged in, kicking and screaming the whole way. She adjusted to her life there by forgetting England. Then, suddenly, she was back in England again. I suppose maybe, just like her siblings, she had hoped to one day get back. But after she was told she could not return again? It didn’t matter if she remembered if she was never going to be able to go back. That knowledge wasn’t practical in England; it had no use for her, so she didn’t need to remember it.

During their second trip in Prince Caspian, she was in Narnia, she could see it with her own two eyes, and yet she didn’t believe when Lucy had said she saw Aslan. Even when Edmund and then Peter said they could see Aslan, she still could not because she didn’t believe He was there. It took her a long time to be able to see what was right in front of her the whole time. (What changed in that time? We don’t know; CS Lewis didn’t tell us her thoughts anymore than he gave us her definite fate. But, at some point, she relented to the fact that Aslan was there, probably because of her siblings and no other reason, just as she only ever really believed anything because of her siblings.)

From the very beginning, she couldn’t bring herself to believe something existed unless she herself could see it right in front her.

And if, while in Narnia, she couldn’t believe Aslan was right there in front of her, why would she be able to believe when all of that was stripped away?

Including her siblings. Her only remaining tie to Narnia.

She has forgotten, she can no longer see it with her own eyes, and her siblings aren’t there to remind her of what once was.

Without going back again herself, there is nothing to bring her back to the place she once loved, even if she actually wanted to be there.

Susan Pevensie is never reunited with her siblings and Aslan.

#chronicles of narnia #the problem of susan #susan pevensie

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tesslahanline1991 · 4 years

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